Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

In recent days, a budgetary provision Members discussed and debated some months ago in this Chamber with the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Burton, has come into effect. It will have an impact on single-parent families and according to reports from the Department, approximately 25,000 single parents will now move from direct payments to the jobseeker's category, which will mean a reduction of approximately €60 in their weekly intake. A number of bodies and organisations representing lone parents have criticised severely this move, which has been signalled for quite some time. This comes in the context that at the time the announcement was made, the Minister, Deputy Burton, was outlining her own philosophical views on how she perceived the challenge facing her in respect of the €440 million cut she will be obliged to engineer within her Department's budget later this year. The question as to how she will square this circle obviously remains speculative at this point but she has gone on record, including yesterday, in a view that is confirmed by those representing single parents, that there is a need to improve child care facilities. I hope there might be an opportunity for the Minister to come before the House at some point in the early stages of the new term, if not before the recess, to advance her philosophy in this regard. Both she and the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Deputy Fitzgerald, have indicated they would like to see some rearrangement of the child benefit scheme that would be used towards improving child care facilities.

I also bring to the attention of Members that yesterday, the Taoiseach visited Ringaskiddy, County Cork, where he officially opened a centre to be known as the Beaufort Laboratory. It will mean that hopefully, Ireland will come to be at the forefront of wave energy scientific research. The launch of the centre yesterday, which will create 700 jobs once it is up and running, is of great and far-reaching significance for Ireland because it has the highest potential in the entire world for the generation of electricity through wave and wind energy off our western coasts. It came on the same day the European Union announced its intention to fund approximately €22 billion in research over five areas, one of which was to be in respect of alternatives to fossil fuels. I ask the Leader to request the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Rabbitte, to come to the House at some point in the near future to give Members an indication of what is the Government's thinking on the subject of alternatives to fossil fuel energy, with particular emphasis on wave and wind energy. Last Monday, I visited the Orkney Islands as part of a delegation from Committee C of the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly, the purpose of which was to visit the European Marine Energy Centre there, which at present is the world leader in that regard. Now that the Ringaskiddy centre has been launched - it will take approximately 12 months for it to open and get up and running - I would like to think Ireland will take the lead in this regard given it has such considerable assets in this area.