Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 14 December 2021

Joint Committee On Children, Equality, Disability, Integration And Youth

Child Poverty: Discussion

Ms Danielle McKenna:

What I think the Senator asked is why there is poverty. Our view is that people may be broke but it is actually the system that is broken, and that is what we need to start talking about. We need to move it from being an issue of shame for people who do not have enough money to the system that has broken and failed families. Families are being failed, children are being failed and we believe it is generational inequality. It is around the social and economic marginalisation that makes poverty happen.

We need to look at who the communities are that are being left behind, and it is very often children and young people of families from working-class and marginalised communities. That is where the investments need to happen. We have seen community services being cut for more than a decade. Since the fall of the Celtic tiger, we have watched the decimation of projects. We have watched the decimation of after-school services and we are about to go into that again, given after-school services are going to be cut, particularly those in working class areas or marginalised communities. What we are seeing is that the resources are being taken from the community and families are growing up in housing that does not meet their needs, in addition to the issues of access to education and healthcare. One of the issues we also see in research is that children from marginalised communities are very often much further behind in their medical development and social development.

We need to look at what is really going on for the people who are being left behind and how we begin to invest in communities and in children. We need to actually invite the people to the table. How is it that we are engaging with people or talking to them about the needs that must be met within communities? For us, the issue of poverty is a State issue.