Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)

Our 15, 16 and 17 year olds should not need to be full-time carers. The challenge is to get them out of those positions. On balance, I would be against paying carer's allowance to people under 18 years of age. We should try to focus on solving their problems through the HSE, education service, my Department's service and so on. We should try to bring all the State's services to bear so that a 16 or 17 year old does not need to be a carer.

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