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

The Minister deserves a medal for the smokescreen she has created in order to present this regressive legislation as something positive for lone parents. She waxed lyrical about a preposterous vision for a wonderful child care and education system which would make lone parent payments unnecessary. Let us clear the decks of the red herrings. All of us would like the level of public services available in the countries to which the Minister referred. The difference is that Finland, Germany and Sweden have state-of-the-art education systems and child care supports that are affordable or, in some cases, free. If this or any other Government succeeds in putting such systems in place, I will be the first to applaud.

However, we have to start from where lone parents are at present. How will lone parents be impacted by the changes introduced in this Bill? They will gradually come into force over the next several years until we reach a point where lone parents will not receive payments once their children reach the age of seven.

It would be useful to rehearse the concerns raised by the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Shortall, with the then Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Cuív, in June 2010 in regard to proposals to reduce the age limit for eligibility to lone parent payments to 13. This is relevant because after next week new applicants with children aged 12 or 13 years will not be entitled to lone parent payments. She stated:

For those who manage to find work, the main problem will undoubtedly be who will mind their children when they are at work. Most will not be able to afford to pay someone else to do it. What is a lone parent to do during their summer months when his or her child is off school? Teenagers are off school for three months in the summer. Is it now Government policy for 13 year olds to have no parental supervision and to be left to their own devices during the three months of their summer holidays? I would like the Minister to address that point in responding to the debate tomorrow.

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