STOPSuicides UK
6th September 2025
Baroness Sherlock OBE
Minister of State
Department for Work and Pensions
Caxton House
Tothill Street
London SW1H 9DA
Subject: Contradiction in Ministerial Statements on CMS and Suicide Risk (Point 3 of your letter to Dr Caroline Johnson MP, 21 August 2025 [Forwarded to Mr Ian Briggs]
Dear Baroness Sherlock,
On behalf of STOPSuicides UK, a campaign group established by bereaved families affected by the actions of the Child Maintenance Service (CMS), I write to express grave concern about the inconsistency in your recent Ministerial correspondence.
In your letter of 21 August 2025 (ref. MC2025/48555) you stated at Point 3:
“The CMS denies any suggestion of a causal link between the Service and suicide of users.”
This categorical denial stands in stark contradiction to the words of your colleague Viscount Younger, who, during evidence to the Work and Pensions Select Committee on 25 January 2023, acknowledged:
“It is absolutely appalling that cases can lead to people taking their own lives. That is dreadful and we must look at all ways in which we can avoid that or have systems and processes that do not lead to that.”
We are deeply troubled that, within just two years, Government ministers are presenting the public and Parliament with mutually exclusive positions on an issue as serious as suicide. The difference is not one of tone but of substance: one statement accepts that CMS processes can contribute to suicides, the other flatly denies it.
This contradiction raises urgent questions:
- Civil Service Narrative – Are ministers being constrained to repeat a civil service–authored denial line, regardless of available evidence, leaving you personally accountable for positions which may later be discredited?
- Transparency – How does this denial reconcile with DWP’s own Internal Process Reviews (IPRs), which have investigated CMS-related deaths and suicides, and with FOI disclosures showing 4,959 paying parent deaths between 2020–22?
- Ministerial Integrity – How can bereaved families, Parliament, and the public have confidence in DWP if ministers are issuing contradictory narratives on matters of life and death?
As you know, other DWP ministers (including Mims Davies) have previously denied a causal link, yet your colleague Viscount Younger publicly acknowledged that such a link exists. The danger is clear: civil service denial narratives may leave ministers personally carrying future accountability for avoidable deaths.
STOPSuicides UK therefore asks you directly:
- Will you withdraw or clarify your statement that “CMS denies any suggestion of a causal link”?
- Will you commit to publishing anonymised IPR findings into suicides linked to CMS?
- Will you confirm whether ministers are free to speak candidly on this matter, or whether your language was dictated by official briefing lines?
Families like ours live daily with the consequences of CMS maladministration, wrongful arrears, and automated enforcement. To deny the possibility of a causal link — when excess deaths are evident in your own data and ministers have acknowledged the problem — is to compound our loss with institutional dishonesty.
We would be grateful for your urgent clarification and a substantive response. Please note that we are making this correspondence public so that bereaved families, Parliament, and the wider public can judge for themselves the consistency and integrity of the Government’s position.
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