Lynn Ruane (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will. There is not loads in it. I thank the Minister for his time. I want to focus briefly on the one-parent family payment. I come from the perspective that the reform in the last few years in regard to one-parent families should be reversed. Such families have traditionally suffered higher deprivation and poverty rates than the general population despite increased social welfare spending. The policy was apparently introduced to encourage more active inclusion of one-parent families through greater uptake of employment and educational opportunities. However, while it was promised that child care supports would be provided to facilitate this, that has not happened. We are now entering summer. As a parent, I can now afford child care, but this week's cost is €200 for one child for me to be able to work during the day. If I were still on a one-parent family payment, that would be 85% of that payment. If I were on a half one-parent family payment and working part-time, most likely in a low-paid job, it would probably be up to 70% of my weekly income. Introducing measures to bring parents back to work does not work if child care costs are not low enough to support women who continue to work through the summer. The scheduling of statements on social protection is quite timely, as the back to work family dividend has been reduced in the last few weeks for lone parents who lost their one-parent family payment this time last year - a loss of €14.90 per week per child. That has a significant impact on weekly child care costs, especially now that child care costs have gone up due to the time of year.

In other jurisdictions, maintenance has been shown to be a way of reducing child poverty. In Ireland, we means-test maintenance. There is a big problem in terms of trying to make money out of the other parent and his or her ability to contribute to the child's upbringing. At the minute, if a parent wants to go to court to pursue maintenance from the other parent, he or she may be fearful of doing so because it could mean a huge loss in rent allowance, family income supplement, and jobseeker's transition payments. This could be rectified through a small change to the legislation about means-testing maintenance. What often happens for lone parents is that they go through the court process and then there is no way of enforcing the outcome. The other parent could be told to pay €80 a week for that child, but may refuse to pay. Because the Department of Social Protection uses the court order as proof, the lone parent still loses 50% of some payments even if the other parent is refusing to pay. These are small things that should be examined so that one-parent families are not being further screwed, even after the cuts. I believe that comes under the liability to maintain family provisions that came into effect on 29 November 1990 and are amended in Part 12 of the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005. The maintenance recovery unit issues determination orders to a liable relative and this can be paid directly to the custodial parent or to the Department of Social Protection and offset against the cost of the one-parent family payment.

The liability to maintain a qualifying child is only contained in the legislation for one-parent family payment and excludes jobseeker's transitional payment, jobseeker's allowance, and family income supplement. This means that when a one-parent family payment ceases for parents with a child aged seven or older, the Department of Social Protection has determined that the non-custodial parent is no longer responsible for their child unless there was a court order in place. After the changes to the one-parent family payment in July 2015, the Department of Social Protection wrote to non-custodial parents advising them that they were no longer obliged to pay maintenance unless there was a court order in place. Not only have one-parent families been shafted by the State, but the Department of Social Protection has also given the go-ahead to non-custodial parents to stop contributing to their children.

People may think the primary parent should seek a court order, but there are many reasons this is not a step single parents want to take. Once the court order is issued, the Department of Social Protection assesses court-ordered maintenance as means, regardless of whether it is paid. This means that 100% of maintenance is deducted from rent allowance, 50% is deducted from jobseeker's allowance, and 60% is deducted from the family income supplement. There is a major risk that if a non-custodial parent gets a court order and it is not complied with, the custodial parent would be significantly worse off. The risk versus return, considering how child maintenance is assessed, means that many lone parents will not go through the courts to get a risky payment and will instead accept no maintenance payment-----