Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

The real case the Deputy outlined is a particularly difficult one for that family. Notwithstanding that the mother will get one year's free preschooling for each of her children, there is a considerable income loss for her and I appreciate that. We would be very conscious of that in whatever decisions we take in the next budget, bearing in mind what has happened in this one. The two measures will have to be seen with regard to how they impact on families.

The disincentive effect is very real when one looks to try to improve social welfare in any way. We have had other examples and there have been letters to the paper that everybody has probably seen, concerning a family with four children. When they listed all they were entitled to on welfare they were doing better than they would be at work. That should never be the case.

The family income supplement is there to support people but there would not be much point in taking with the one hand to give back with the other, all coming from a social welfare payment designed to support people with children. This is one of the issues we shall consider because it would be very wrong that somebody on social welfare should have a greater incentive to stay that way compared to the person on low income who is actually working. These are all issues we must thrash out in respect of future policy in respect of child benefit.

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