Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I apologise to the committee for my absence. I was in the Dáil Chamber. I will not elaborate on the amendment in view of the fact the section has already been dealt with. I tabled the amendment because the working family payment was the Government's big idea. We were told a lot of work was being done on it. It was going to replace the family income supplement, which was heavily criticised in the Fine Gael election manifesto for some good reasons. We now find that what has happened is the family income supplement has been reintroduced but has just been renamed the working family payment. The Minister recognised in the course of her Second Stage contribution the family income supplement as it stands, or the working family payment if we want to call it that now, needs to be altered because there are obvious poverty traps. It could be altered in a number of ways which, I would argue, would benefit the Exchequer rather than the Exchequer losing. The Minister has indicated she will do some work on this anyway. The purpose of the amendment was for the Minister to come back here with her proposals within the next three months in order that we can discuss them to see how they achieve the objective she no doubt desires for them.