Children: Maintenance
(asked on 6th January 2026) - View Source
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much money for child maintenance was collected under the collect and pay service in the past three years; and for how many children this money was collected.
The Department publishes Child Maintenance Service official statistics every three months. Table 4 of the latest National tables provides the total amount of maintenance paid via Collect and Pay each quarter between January 2015 and September 2025.
The below table shows Money paid each Quarter via Collect and Pay for Great Britain, for the past 12 quarters October 2022 to September 2025
Quarter | Maintenance paid (£ millions) |
Oct to Dec 2022 | 49.1 |
Jan to Mar 2023 | 49.1 |
Apr to Jun 2023 | 52.1 |
Jul to Sep 2023 | 57.5 |
Oct to Dec 2023 | 56.6 |
Jan to Mar 2024 | 58.7 |
Apr to Jun 2024 | 61.2 |
Jul to Sep 2024 | 65.4 |
Oct to Dec 2024 | 67.8 |
Jan to Mar 2025 | 72.5 |
Apr to Jun 2025 | 78.2 |
Jul to Sep 2025 | 84.4 |
Source: Child Maintenance Service Management Information
Notes:
- Figures provided are for child maintenance only and do not include fees for the use of the service and are rounded to the nearest £100,000.
- In a very small number of cases a child maintenance payment may be refunded to the Paying Parent. These Paying Parents are currently still counted as compliant and the money is counted as paid. In a very small number of cases a child maintenance payment may be incorrectly assigned to the wrong parent. If the money is then assigned to the correct parent then the money paid will be counted twice.
The below table shows the number of children covered by Collect and Pay arrangements by payment status, for Great Britain, by quarter end, December 2022 to September 2025
Quarter end [note 2] | Collect & Pay, paying [note 3] | Collect & Pay, not paying [note 4] | Total |
December 2022 | 167,183 | 140,187 | 307,370 |
March 2023 | 170,753 | 144,587 | 315,343 |
June 2023 | 181,346 | 140,181 | 321,526 |
September 2023 | 191,532 | 137,948 | 329,485 |
December 2023 | 192,539 | 146,012 | 338,548 |
March 2024 | 200,457 | 146,153 | 346,605 |
June 2024 | 208,444 | 150,600 | 359,038 |
September 2024 | 216,082 | 160,165 | 376,245 |
December 2024 | 223,538 | 169,759 | 393,297 |
March 2025 | 235,795 | 172,915 | 408,713 |
June 2025 | 256,722 | 164,079 | 420,799 |
September 2025 | 271,720 | 160,907 | 432,627 |
Source: Stat-Xplore
Note:
- Statistical disclosure control has been applied to this table to avoid the release of confidential data. Totals may not sum due to the disclosure control applied.
- The data is collected at the end of each quarter.
- Children covered by Collect & Pay arrangements in which the Paying Parent paid some child maintenance during the quarter.
- Children covered by Collect & Pay arrangements in which the Paying Parent paid no child maintenance during the quarter. This will include some children associated with active arrangements for which no ongoing child maintenance was due in the quarter, i.e. arrears only cases.