Are We Putting Children First, Or Are We Incentivising Conflict?

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A headline recently stopped me in my tracks:

“Single mothers could be £10,000 worse off if they marry.”

Whether that figure applies to every family isn’t the point.

The question is far bigger.

Have we created a system that sometimes makes family stability financially harder while unintentionally rewarding conflict?

Before anyone jumps to conclusions, let me be absolutely clear.

This is not an attack on single mothers.

I was a single parent myself.

I know what it feels like to carry the weight of everything on your shoulders. I worked, parented, comforted, disciplined, attended school meetings, managed appointments and tried to be both mum and dad.

Millions of single parents across the UK do exactly the same every single day, often through circumstances completely outside their control relationship breakdown, domestic abuse, bereavement or abandonment.

Single parents deserve respect and support.

But so do the children.

And children deserve policies that genuinely put their best interests first.

We need to start asking difficult questions.

Why should any family be financially worse off because two committed adults decide to marry or live together?

Why do some parents tell me they feel the system rewards separation more than cooperation?

Why do so many families leave the Family Court and the Child Maintenance Service feeling they have been pushed further apart rather than helped to work together?

These aren’t questions driven by ideology.

They are questions driven by the experiences of thousands of families.

Child maintenance matters, however children need more than money

Financial support is essential.

No child should suffer because a parent refuses to contribute financially.

Government figures show child maintenance helps lift around 120,000 children out of relative poverty every year.

However raising children is about far more than a monthly payment.

Children need love.

Children need stability.

Children need emotional security.

Where it is safe, children benefit from having meaningful relationships with both parents and other supportive adults in their lives.

Research consistently shows that, on average, children raised in stable, low-conflict family environments experience better emotional wellbeing, stronger educational outcomes and lower levels of poverty.

That doesn’t mean every two-parent family is healthy, and it certainly doesn’t mean single-parent families cannot raise incredible children, they absolutely can.

The key factors are security, and stability, and securty not marital status.

Yet our systems often seem disconnected.

The Family Court considers arrangements for children.

The Child Maintenance Service calculates financial responsibility.

One system talks about children’s welfare.

The other largely applies a financial formula.

Parents repeatedly tell me these systems don’t always work together. Some believe that financial rules can increase conflict over overnight care, while others feel genuine involvement in a child’s life isn’t properly recognised.

These concerns deserve careful research and evidence-led review rather than assumptions. If policies unintentionally create incentives that increase conflict, Parliament has a responsibility to examine them.

We need evidence, not politics.

That is why I am calling for a Mandatory Three-Tier Triage System across both the Family Court and the Child Maintenance Service.

Tier 1 – Standard Assessment

For straightforward cases where parents cooperate and there are no safeguarding concerns.

Tier 2 – Enhanced Financial and Family Assessment

For cases involving disputed care arrangements, hidden income, blended families, financial abuse, coercive control, parental alienation, repeated CMS disputes or other complex issues requiring specialist assessment.

Tier 3 – Court and Multi-Agency Review

For high-conflict cases involving domestic abuse, child protection concerns or repeated litigation, ensuring that courts, CMS and safeguarding agencies work together instead of in isolation.

We also need independent research into modern families.

Government should examine:-

• Whether the current child maintenance rules unintentionally influence parenting arrangements

• Whether there are financial disincentives for marriage, and other long-term committed relationships

• How shared parenting affects children’s wellbeing

• The role of blended families and step-parents in supporting children

• Whether Family Court and CMS decision-making should be better integrated

• How we can reduce conflict while increasing cooperation between separated parents

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If the evidence shows the current system works well, we should accept that.

If however it shows families are being failed, we must have the courage to change it.

This campaign isn’t about mothers versus fathers.

It isn’t about left versus right.

It isn’t about reducing child maintenance.

It is about recognising that children need more than financial calculations.

They deserve financial security.

They deserve meaningful relationships.

They deserve stability.

They deserve parents who are encouraged to cooperate rather than compete.

Most importantly, children deserve a government that builds policies around children’s long-term wellbeing, and not systems that unintentionally keep parents in conflict.

It’s time for evidence-led reform.

It’s time for joined-up thinking between Family Court and the Child Maintenance Service.

And it’s time to put children, and not conflict at the heart of family justice.

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Deanna Newell Family Law

Advocacy for truth-tellers, survivors, and the children who deserve better