Ms Caroline Fahy:

Low pay is prevalent among lone parents. We tabled a parliamentary question on this last year to see what happens when a person loses the one-parent family payment. At the start of this month around 5,000 lone parents lost the one-parent family payment because of the age of their youngest child. A lone parent in employment earning net €200 per week has lost €70 per week because of the change. The worst part is a person who earns a low income from employment will be worse off than a person who earns a bit more. The sum of €70 per week is not insignificant and would probably cover a part-time child care place. These changes undermine the Government's priority of supporting people.