Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

I ask the Deputy to let me finish. He may or may not know that there are 92,000 recipients of one-parent family payment. Over a long period of time this will affect a small number of people in order to improve the outcomes. I do not doubt his good wishes for lone parents, but if we are to have an honest discussion we need to recognise that all the research has shown that the outcomes in Ireland are not as good as they ought to be for the kind of money being spent.

Why has Sinn Féin not had any difficulty with the age limit of seven that applies 80 or 90 miles north of here? The various payments for children and social welfare recipients generally are far smaller there than they are in the South. I know a number of Deputy Ó Snodaigh's colleagues in the North and I know they are extremely concerned for the welfare of children and parents.

We need to consider parents and children. There are many people in relationships where both parents are either on social welfare or in very low-paid work. When they are in low-paid work they are contributing. To return to what I said earlier, we need to get away from saying that we have parents and we have children, and then we have lone parents and the children of lone parents. There is a need to say we have parents and children, and we want to set a structure that allows parents to give their children the best life possible - whether that is one parent, parenting on his or her own, or whether it is two parents either in a marriage or cohabiting. The personal relationships that people have should not be the business of the State. We should be here to build a civilised system that supports parents and supports children. In this debate we need to be thinking about the future and we need to think about the outcomes for children. From some of the language used here children appear to be put in a particular category that does not recognise that intelligence, ability and ambition are evenly distributed throughout the population. It is not necessarily dependent on the particular relationship status of a child's parent. We should not set those kinds of limits in the kind of language used in the debate.

I would like the Deputies to outline why they are so fearful about changes for good outcomes being introduced very slowly given that 92,000 people are parenting on their own and over a period from now to 2016 a maximum of 11,000 people will be affected. This year, based on what is happening in many of the countries I have referenced, we have created the Pathways to Work with the emphasis on providing for people who are out of work regardless of their relationship status opportunities to go back to education or training, start their own business and ultimately to become financially independent. The Pathways to Work, which I launched some months ago and which is being rolled out this year, will take a case-management approach,

That will be the case from this year on. By the time the changes come into force, the changes in the Department will be largely up and running. I know that in case management in the other countries to which I referred, one of the things that must be taken into account is the particular family circumstances of an individual. That is the purpose of case management. Some of the Deputies have perhaps forgotten that the Department of Social Protection is changing. From being simply a social welfare Department that checks and pays out entitlements and benefits to a total of €20 billion - which is a lot of money - it is becoming a Department that is fully integrated, so that when somebody comes in to collect a benefit, regardless of his or her relationship status, he or she will be in an integrated system. He or she will be encouraged to seek work, education or training, and of course his or her family circumstances will be taken into account, as is the case in other countries I mentioned. I have been working with my colleague, the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, in this regard. The Government set up the Department of Children and Youth Affairs as a full Department for the first time ever in the history of the State. That is a progressive development because, regardless of our political differences, we are all in favour of doing the best for our children and ensuring they have good outcomes. The establishment of the Department of Children and Youth Affairs and the appointment of my colleague, Deputy Fitzgerald, as Minister allows for a focus that was not possible previously, as some Deputies have said. It is a big job, but Irish people can do most things, and I think we can do this. We can change the landscape and make progress. I recommend the changes to the Deputies.

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