Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

That is what the IMF and the OECD are saying to us; that people from the age of 20 to whenever they retire at the age of 65 or 66 are of working age and they may have particular needs because they are parents or young adults but that, essentially, we should provide a full range of opportunities to them in terms of work, training and employment opportunities but, equally, if they have needs because they are parenting that child care and after-school care is available. In Scandinavia, that is often where they put the money rather than to have large direct payments for families. It is a shift in the balance of how we provide support from the way it has evolved to date. That is something we need to consider.

Senator O'Brien mentioned redundancy rebates. I was very struck recently, as I am sure were most people, when TalkTalk closed down over a short period, with great personal distress to the workers involved in Waterford and the south east, and people were offered redundancy.