Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

In case Senator Trevor Ó Clochartaigh is confused, the only people who will affected by this change in 2012 are those who are new to the lone parent structures. Children over 12 years of age will be affected. In 2013 children over ten years of age will be affected, and in 2014 children over seven years of age will be affected.

In regard to persons who were lone parents in April last year, they will only be affected when they have a child of 17 years or older in 2013, a child of 16 years in 2014 and a child of seven years in 2015 and 2016. For those who became lone parents from last April, the provision applies to a child over 14 years in 2012, over 12 years in 2013, over ten years in 2014 and over sevens in 2015 and 2016. Long lead-in times have been explicitly provided for in the Bill.

As I said, we are doing this alongside the National Employment and Entitlements Service which was launched some months ago and is being developed this year. We are talking about a relatively small number of people who may end up in receipt of a jobseeker's payment in the interim period. In that context, they will receive a personalised service in which their family circumstances will be taken into account. The difficulty we have as a country - it may be difficult for people to accept this - is that we are spending over €1 billion on lone parents. Senator van Turnhout just reminded us that somebody from the UN said that the problem for Ireland is that despite that significant spend, the outcome is that the people still most at risk are the children of lone parents. There are tens of thousands of lone parents who parent on their own who do not receive the one-parent family payment. There are 92,000 parents on the one-parent family payment, but there are tens of thousands who are not, because they are in full-time employment, self-employed or business proprietors. The children facing the greatest risk of ending up poor are the children whose mothers have low educational attainment and do not have the capacity to work or find employment. What we must ask ourselves is whether there is a way of utilising the funds we have that would produce better outcomes for those children. That is my objective.

As I have said previously, Irish society has made significant expansions at different times and I do not see why we cannot set that as a goal and do it. In my time in politics I have listened endlessly to people talking about child care and about expanding it. I have seen wonderful initiatives and innovations and I am a particular admirer of the work Senator Zappone has done. However, we need to think more ambitiously. Senator Darragh O'Brien is concerned that implies making demands, but politics is about deciding to make staged steps forward and expansions.

I listened to the contributions made by the Sinn Féin Members. Can they explain to me why there has not been a peep from them? I know enough about child care in the North to know how good, bad or indifferent it is in various ways. Sinn Féin should acknowledge that our unemployment, child benefit and almost all social welfare payments are significantly better than those north of the Border. Our support and housing supplements are also significantly higher than north of the Border. I have not heard a peep from Sinn Féin on these issues. I have enough contact with the North to have a fairly detailed knowledge of the situation there. Sinn Féin has no problems with far lower levels of social welfare in the North, where it is in government. I know Sinn Féin will say the reason it does not raise this is that it does not control tax policy there and, therefore, cannot raise taxes in order to make higher social welfare payments. If the age of seven is an acceptable cut-off point in the North for Sinn Féin, why does it see our moving in an ambitious way to achieve what would be an all-Ireland target as inappropriate?

I do not know why the age of seven was chosen in the North or in the United Kingdom, but I can guess why because I know why it was chosen in other countries. It has to do with the age at which there is good provision available for both preschool and after school care and when the child is well settled in the education system. In the Scandinavian countries that is quite early. In Italy and in France there are maternal schools for children of an early age because of the kind of developments made by people like Maria Montessori almost 100 years ago. We know a little about traditions in different countries.

We do not have a very strong preschool tradition in Ireland. We had many radical women around the turn of the last century. We had people like Louie Bennett who developed facilities for children, particularly here in the city. That would have been the start of the equivalent movement in Ireland. What I am asking, particularly Sinn Féin, is why it is okay to pay amounts so much lower in the North? I am aware that some provisions are better there, but some are not as good as those here. Why should we not look at getting better value for the large amount we are spending. I said previously that there is not a very large saving in this. The estimated saving this will yield is €0.3 million in 2012, €2 million in 2013, €5.8 million in 2014 and €11.9 million in 2015. What will happen is that with the development of appropriate after-school services, money will be spent in a different way, as happened with the early childhood care.

The ESRI report published yesterday, Understanding Childhood Deprivation in Ireland, is quite a tome of statistics based on the SILC 2009 data and study of 1,800 households with children. The report found that children have a higher poverty risk than adults and those children are more likely to be in low income and jobless households, that poverty is especially detrimental for children, due to its long term effects that persist into adulthood and that an adequate income is the basic requirement to alleviate poverty. It found that child and family income supports play a critical role in protecting children. Furthermore, the mother's education, employment, especially of the mother, and family stability are important.

These findings are a repetition of and consistent with everything I have read on this issue over the past 20 years. Senator Zappone spoke earlier of the value of quality education and initiatives that would hold younger parents. I was involved years ago in what was considered a radical move and has proved to be since. This involved changing the social welfare rules. When I was a Minister of State and Michael Woods was the senior Minister, we were involved in changing the rules so as to enable lone parents to stay in education. In those days - the early 1990s - if lone parents wanted to get the allowance, they had to stay home and do nothing. Now, we are just trying to change and to look at the countries we admire for their provision and care for children and considering making similar reforms.

The requirement to develop child care, particularly after-school care, is demanding. We have primary schools all around the country. Many primary schools are in urban centres with significant community facilities attached to them, such as the one I was involved in opening today. Surely, it is not beyond our capacity as a society to decide we will develop after school care facilities. It is no longer simply a question of buildings. In many cases it is a question of access to buildings. Given the timeframe provided for in the Bill and given the changes happening with regard to Pathways to Work, I am confident we will be able to expand and develop in a way I hope will be hugely positive for lone parents who end up being confined to lone parent's allowance or to some small additional income rather than being full participants in terms of their capacity to become financially independent.