A FATHER is demanding a major overhaul of the Child Support Agency to make the system fairer.

Meltham man James McElhoney says the agency is taking so much money from his wage that he is, in effect, working for nothing and his bank account is continually overdrawn.

He has condemned a system that has brought him nothing but anxiety and distress.

He hoped to buy his council flat, but the amount he is paying to the CSA - on top of the usual household bills - has scuppered those plans.

Now, Mr McElhoney aims to do all he can to raise the issue politically. He will be urging Colne Valley MP Kali Mountford to help him.

The 44-year-old adult careers adviser says the CSA has a two-tier system, with people assessed before March, 2003 - as he was - paying more than those assessed since.

He added: "I now pay almost £400 direct to the CSA out of my wage.

"Yet a colleague of mine is in exactly the same circumstances, with two children, but pays £280.

"The only difference was that he was assessed later."

Mr McElhoney, a former postman, became a mature student in 1996 when he did a degree in sociology, followed by a master's degree in sociology and politics.

He then went on to do a year-long postgraduate course in careers guidance at Huddersfield University. He now works in this area.

During the 1980s and 1990s he lived in Cambridge.

He was married and has two sons, now aged eight and 10. But the marriage broke down in 1999.

Mr McElhoney said he built up debts of more than £20,000 during six years of study - some of it part-time - to secure a job he loves.

Yet that debt, along with the money he spends travelling to Cambridge to pick up his sons and bring them back to Meltham for three days a month, is not taken into account when the assessment is made.

He is considering declaring himself bankrupt, quitting work and living on benefits.

Mr McElhoney said his original assessment took about a year to finalise - and was then backdated, leaving him with a £3,000 lump sum to pay on top of the monthly amount.

"Funnily enough, even if I declare myself bankrupt this lump sum won't be written off," he said.

"I've been trying to get the CSA to look again at my assessment, but after six months I've had no response," he added.

"Every time I phone the CSA I just get passed from department to department. No one person has overall responsibility for each case.

"I just don't feel I'm treated with dignity, respect or equality.

"I am quite prepared to take financial and moral responsibility for my children. It's just that the system needs to be much fairer and parents who do not live with their children always seem to get clobbered by the CSA," said Mr McElhoney.

"There are many other parents out there struggling. We just see the system as state-enforced bullying."