Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The Minister talks about these measures aimed at reducing poverty outcomes in families and the measures to support lone parents, but all of the measures introduced by the previous Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, show that poverty increased in the families of lone parents. I will not read out the statistics here but what is absolutely clear is that the measures to activate employment for lone parents forced more of them out of employment. When one talks about reducing poverty, one has to look at it in a holistic way and look at the provision of child care and housing supports in particular. Housing is in a massive crisis and rents are soaring through the roof. Tomorrow, there will be a strike in Tesco nationally which is the type of low-paid job that many lone parents are being forced into. They are forced to seek more hours in those kinds of jobs which pay very badly. There is no point of talking about pushing lone parents into work and out of poverty unless one looks holistically at the sort of supports that are put in place for them, including child care, housing and the rate of pay they can expect to get in employment, including the low level of the minimum wage at the moment.

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