Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am very mindful of that. I want to move this on. I want to get the changes made as soon as possible, and administrative issues are being dealt with, specifically the liable relatives and the requirement to prove that the maintenance was sought in going to court. I think we can deal with that fairly quickly, but more work has to be done on the legislative requirements and the impact of the Social Welfare Bill in a number of places. We just want to make sure we get it right. That is the most important thing. I am keen we move as quickly as possible in strengthening the attachment orders. The way I see it is that if you are meant to pay a certain amount for the maintenance of your child, just get on with it and stop this nonsense whereby one week you pay, and then you miss a few payments and come back and make another few, and then there are arrears, and then you go to court, and all that. That is a waste of everybody's time. If you are supposed to pay it, just pay it. That will be the secret of the success here if we can manage to get an attachment order that makes it stick such that payments have to be made and are automatically deducted. I will be working on that in the coming weeks.

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