Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I raised this issue with the Minister in advance of the budget because the series of austerity measures that have been introduced have hit so hard.

That is particularly evident in low income families and even in some middle income families too. The Minister is probably aware that the ESRI report on the distributional impact of budgets over recent years indicated that the 2012 budget, of all budgets, disproportionately hit people on lower incomes. The report indicated a reduction of approximately 2% or 2.5% of income for the poorest 40% of households, as opposed to a 0.7% impact on the top 30% of households. He is probably also aware that other studies, particularly one carried out by TASC, demonstrate very clearly that the group most at risk of poverty in this State is lone parents. They lost the highest percentage of income in the 2011 budget and that was exacerbated by the 2012 budget.

The Minister has spoken of sharing the burden fairly but I remind him of some of the decisions taken last year. There was a cut to child benefit for third and subsequent children and a cut to the earnings disregard for one-parent families.

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