The authorities came up with a structure for the recovery of alimony from negligent parents: the risks are named

Debt collectors will be set on non-payers

In Russia, a special state fund for the collection of alimony may appear. A good idea, which is rooted in the zero years, was voiced in a new way by the Commissioner for Human Rights Tatyana Moskalkova. But so far there is not the slightest understanding of what forces and mechanisms will be used to form this “pod”, what effect it will eventually give, and which departments will be entrusted with control over it.

Last year, the number of complaints about non-payment of child support by the second parent increased by 26% compared to 2021, Moskalkova said. Most of the appeals are related to the fact that the debtors did not provide data on their real income. Accordingly, it is necessary to strengthen the efficiency of recovery, and a special fund seems to be the best help. In this regard, the Ombudsman recalled the draft law on the register of alimony debtors developed by the Ministry of Justice in April 2022. According to the document, this list should accumulate information about persistent non-payers who were brought to administrative or criminal liability, as well as those who were put on the wanted list.

The idea of ​​creating a “alimony fund” at state expense was born in the depths of the State Duma back in 2009. Subsequently, officials of different ranks returned to the issue again and again, for example, in 2020, such a fund was proposed by the speaker of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienko, and in 2021, by Anna Kuznetsova, Commissioner for Children’s Rights under the President of the Russian Federation. But things did not move beyond words. The meaning is clear in general terms: the payment to minor children who are not financially supported by a parent is unconditionally assumed by the state – and it, with the help of its own (or third-party) structures, “chases” defaulters.

And here’s what’s even more important. In this case, the concept of “fund” is not a separate office with its own head, staff, premises, property, maintenance costs, branches. The Alimony Fund is a certain necessary amount of money allocated to separate accounts for transactions.

“As follows from Moskalkova’s report, the number of pending enforcement proceedings for the recovery of alimony has decreased by 11.2 thousand compared to 2021. And this, on the one hand, is good, – says the head of the analytical department of AMarkets Artem Deev. “At the same time, almost 800,000 industries still remain open, which means that a huge number of children cannot receive the funds due to them (both legally and in conscience).”

By itself, the project of a unified alimony fund is quite sound, which cannot be said about the last year’s step of the Ministry of Justice regarding the register of alimony debtors, the expert believes. In fact, this measure, designed to facilitate the work of bailiffs and relevant departments, will in no way help children receive money. A person can be listed in the register and at the same time hide from the state for a long time and successfully. Often, it is enough to move to a neighboring street. The task is, argues Deev, so that children living in single-parent families, at least, are not deprived financially. The Fund can help in solving it, however, there is no understanding yet how it will be formed purely technically.

“In addition to the state budget, fines and forfeits from non-payers for overdue days of alimony payments can be a source of replenishment of such a state “pod”, says Alexei Zubets, a professor at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation. – Another thing is that emergency, draconian measures that create grounds for abuse and corruption should be avoided. Who exactly will be looking for negligent parents, identifying their bank accounts, collecting debts? The tax service does not have resources for this, specially allocated people. Apparently, it will have to be outsourced to private structures. For example, the same collectors who will get a new promising market. The program can be supervised by the Social Fund, it is only necessary to provide it with the appropriate powers, to regulate all the details in a legislative manner.”

In the zero years and even in the early 2010s, when a significant part of wages were in the shadow sector, it was more difficult to implement the idea. Today, at the time of all-encompassing digitalization, it has been revived on a new technological base, says Sergey Smirnov, a leading researcher at INION RAS. If a person works officially and receives money through the accounting department (and there are an absolute majority of them), it collects alimony from him automatically, guided by the base of court decisions in civil cases. At the same time, salaries “in an envelope” have not disappeared anywhere, their recipients still need to be identified. Another potential problem is the self-employed and individual entrepreneurs, who can split their income, register for relatives, and so on. As for the most suitable candidate for the role of the executor, he sees the Social Fund (in close cooperation with the Federal Tax Service), since social protection is its target function.