Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

Regarding lone parents, who Senator Mooney and a large number of Senators mentioned, the ESRI published a report last night which is referred to in the newspapers today. Senator Bacik raised this question also. The lone parents structure was changed forever in Ireland by the work done by Frank Cluskey, a former leader of the Labour Party, in the early 1970s when he introduced what was then called an unmarried mothers allowance. Within the next ten years, most of the institutions in which children were brought up because the mother on her own had no income had closed. That is an episode in our history which changes in social welfare addressed in a positive way, and they were continued by all parties in government. A concern about supporting parents and children in low-income families is important.

Society has changed, and that is what the ESRI report today states, namely, that the one-parent family payment may, and I emphasise the word "may", have a disincentive effect on partnership, that is, somebody in a cohabiting marriage or other partnership arrangement in which both parents are publicly acknowledged as living with their children. It states that there may be a disincentive that would not arise with a more couple friendly system of family income support. That is something worth debating and examining. I would like to see us reaching a reform process that acknowledges both the mother and the father, and in which we talk about children. In many Scandinavian countries the specific status regarding parenting on one's own is when one's child is very young and one gets additional supports, particularly supports to return to education.

The question we must ask ourselves about the lone parents structure is why are outcomes are so bad for some families. The one indicator we have on that is that if a lone parent who is parenting on his or her own stopped education at a very early age or was restricted in building up an educational qualification that is now required to get a decent job in society, the predictions in terms of their child growing up in a poor household and becoming a poor adult are much stronger than if that parent goes back to education. That is a critical reform.