Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The response from the Department states the 30,000 people who will be affected by this change next July will be "fully supported" by the Department in making the transition. They will not be fully supported. They are going to suffer an horrendous income loss, with no compensation from the Department or anyone else. In 2012 the Minister for Social Protection, while discussing an amendment to prevent this change, said:

I entirely agree that seven is too young for anyone to seriously contemplate any of these things without there being a system of safe, affordable and accessible child care in place, similar to what is found in the Scandinavian countries whose systems of social protection we aspire to. That is why I am undertaking tonight that I will only proceed with the measure to reduce the upper age limit to seven years in the event that I get a credible and bankable commitment on the delivery of such a system of child care by the time of this year's budget. If this is not forthcoming, the measure will not proceed.

That could not be more clear. The Minister of State did not give that commitment, but the Minister did. While I have every respect for the Minister of State, in fairness, the Minister should be here to explain why she is so flagrantly breaching her own commitment. Is the Minister of State aware that in 2012 there were 100,000 or so lone parents in the country, 60,000 of whom were working? After the changes introduced by the Minister in the past two and a half years, there are now 36,000 lone parents working - some 24,000 have dropped out of the workforce. Has any account been taken of the actual net saving to the Exchequer? I know that a gross saving to the Exchequer can be demonstrated through the simple mathematical device of taking out the cost of the payments and adjusting accordingly, but I suggest the net saving to the Exchequer is very little. There may be a net loss for the Exchequer because there are 24,000 fewer people working and contributing; they are now drawing the full lone parent's allowance instead of a partial allowance which many of them received previously.

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