Ontario agency admits to overbilling on child support payments

The Ottawa Citizen, January 14, 2012, by Lee Greenberg

TORONTO — Ontario’s controversial Family Responsibility Office has been overbilling 1,700 parents, mostly fathers, for as long as 13 years, the province admitted Friday.

The 1,700 parents were overbilled by an average $75 each month, after the agency wrongly applied a cost of living adjustment that was eliminated in 1997.

Those who were overpaid will not be forced to give the money back.

Instead, taxpayers will foot the $5.3 million bill for the agency’s mistake.

“This error’s been found and it’s being corrected,” said Liberal cabinet minister John Milloy. “We’re going to be reaching out to those individuals (who were overbilled) and talking to them about their situation, formally alerting them.”

The Family Responsibility Office, or FRO, is responsible for ensuring court-ordered child support payments are made. More than 97 per cent of all payers overseen by the office are male.

Milloy said the agency discovered the problem at some point in 2011. No one will be fired for the mistakes, he added.

“I see this as something very serious,” he said in an interview. “I’m not trying to minimize it, but … there’s been lots of action taken to reform FRO, to update computer systems, to update customer relations and it’s on a much firmer footing.”

The billing mistake is only the latest controversy to engulf FRO.  More..

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Boys raised by traditional families 'do better at school'

Boys raised in traditional families are more likely to perform well at school and avoid suspension than those brought up by single mothers, it has emerged.

The Telegraph, UK, By Graeme Paton, Education Editor, 03 January 2012

Boys brought up by single mothers are more likely to struggle, according to the report by the University of Chicago.

In a major study, researchers said family structures had a much more significant effect on boys’ early education than school type or even the gender of teachers.

It found that boys were much more likely to misbehave, be excluded from school and go on to achieve low grades after rebelling against “emotionally distant” parents.

The pattern is particularly marked in single-parent families where mothers “invest disproportionately less in their sons or feel less warm toward them” than daughters.

The disclosure comes amid continuing concern over the gender gap at the heart of the education system. More..

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