Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

I too reject this motion and the Bill. I wish to correct the record of the House. The Taoiseach said earlier today that the House would have ten hours of debate on Second Stage of the Social Welfare and Pensions Bill but that is not correct because we had four hours' debate and at the last moment we are presented with a whole raft of amendments which substantially change the Bill and make it, effectively, a different Bill and a guillotine is imposed. This makes a mockery of all the talk by this Government when it came into office of a new type of politics, new transparency and real political change. While I was not a Member of this House at the time, I have been informed by Members who were here in the previous Dáil that the Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, when in Opposition, would have been one of the first to complain about the imposition of a guillotine on important legislation. It is ironic that 14 months on, she is now imposing such a guillotine when Deputies have not had proper time to scrutinise this raft of new amendments. It defies any credibility to suggest that she has not had sufficient time between the December budget and now, to bring forward these amendments earlier or to include them in the main body of the Bill.

The one amendment that everyone wanted to see in this Bill is the one amendment the Minister has not brought forward. The one amendment we would have welcomed, even if late in the day, is the one she has refused to include, to delete section 4, and for her to give up on this disgraceful attempt to cut lone parent payments when children reach the age of seven years. It is not just that seven is too young, as the Minister acknowledged last week, eight is too young, nine is too young, ten is too young, 11 is too young and 12 is too young. There is room for discussion after that age but in many cases 13 and 14 is also too young an age at which to leave children on their own when their parents need to go out to work. It is laughable.

For a moment when I heard the Minister announce we were to have a Scandinavian model of child care, I thought all of our birthdays had come at once. However, when I gave it more thought and I talked to a Swedish friend of mine who told me about Scandinavian health care, I suddenly realised that this statement had little meaning and was no more than a smokescreen to try to soften the blow of this disgraceful cut to lone parents' payments. In Scandinavia, there is free child care, almost from birth, from the age of one right up to the age of 14. It is state-of-the-art child care which is available to everyone. The notion that the Minister will introduce such a model by December - much as I would like this to be achieved by December - is laughable against the background of brutal cuts being demanded under the EU-IMF programme and everything being cut. I hope the Minister will prove me wrong but it defies credibility. The only proposal before us, despite the words spoken last week, is the cut which will take immediate effect when the Bill is passed with the possibility that people may be obliged to leave their jobs. The critical point is that a Government which states it wants labour activation measures is introducing a measure which will drive lone parents out of work and force them into greater dependency on social welfare. Even at this late stage, I ask the Minister to withdraw the Bill, to accept our amendments to delete section 4. Let us deliver the Scandinavian model of child care first before the Minister touches lone parents' payments.

The jobseeker's benefit amendment is another attack on the low paid and which will disproportionately hit lone parents and women workers again. It will mean a €20 to €30 a week cut in the earnings of part-time workers, the majority of whom are women and a very significant number of whom are lone parents. What is the justification for this as it will be a disincentive for people to take up part-time work and may likely force more people out of employment and into dependency on social welfare? It is another disgraceful move and that amendment should be removed also.

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