Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

That is correct. I wish to read out a report on the National One-Parent Family Network Facebook page. It states:

The transition to other payments has been disgracefully handled. Some people have had their increases in FIS, others nothing. Some people have nothing to live on for the week! They've been told to go to the CWO for emergency payments (but have you tried getting to see the CWO during the school holidays with your children???).

Shocking disregard to lone parents and their needs...I witnessed women crying, begging and stressed out near breakdowns in my local Intreo office today. Horrible, horrible, cruel treatment by Joan Burton and her cronies. It's a sad day in Ireland when parents can't even buy food for their children because of the ineptitude of the system.

This cut and the role of the Labour Party in this cut will go down as the most horrific anti-woman, anti-working people, anti-people and regressive measure introduced by this Government. What makes it even more disgusting is the Thatcherite rhetoric surrounding it. There is this notion that it is a pro-work measure. It is not a pro-work measure, it is a pro-poverty measure. It is pro driving people into low-paid jobs.

The way the debate has been conducted by the Labour Party and the Tánaiste and Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, above all, has been a disgrace. Instead of engaging with the reality that over 10,000 one-parent families will lose at least €87, that reality has simply been ignored. The talk is about getting people back to work and incentivising people. Those people are already at work. In cutting their payments, the Government is making it impossible for them to afford child care, pushing them further away from work. The Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, promised that we would not have anything like this until we had a credible and bankable guarantee of Scandinavian-style child care.

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