Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and acknowledge her indication that this is a priority issue for her, as supported by her frequent references to it. I hope we will now see intensified action to address the issues involves. I am a member of the Joint Committee on Social Protection which produced an important report on the situation of lone parents in Ireland. That document is as close as we have got so far to a comprehensive analysis of the supports, solutions and actions needed to improve the position and life experiences of lone parents and their children. The report acknowledges that the policy we devise must be cognisant of the fact that Ireland has a very poor historical record in the treatment of lone parents and their children and that existing disadvantages have been exacerbated by the changes introduced in 2012. The evidence is clear in our report, the Indecon report and the statistics from the CSO and elsewhere.Others have spoken about the deprivation and consistent poverty figures and the fact that children in lone-parent families are more than three and a half times more likely to be living in consistent poverty than children in two-parent families. However, there is a range of other figures that can be discussed. Some 65% of homeless families with children in Ireland are headed by lone parents. The alarm bells regarding the 59% deprivation rate have been ringing for some time. The situation was exacerbated in 2012.

I will speak first to the Indecon report before discussing the recommendations of our report. The Indecon report points to the fact that while there is a small decrease of 3% to 4% in welfare dependency and some increase in employment, that employment does not necessarily improve the financial situation of lone parents. A majority of the lone parents surveyed, 53%, said that their financial situation is now worse while a quarter of them, 26%, described their financial situation as much worse. That is a serious concern and it must be examined and addressed. Some 5% saw themselves as considerably better off but, as we have heard, there is a range of experiences. The majority are still signalling that they are much worse off. Another figure of concern in the report is the fact that 63%, almost two thirds of those surveyed, who were in full-time employment were still in deprivation and doing without three or more of the essentials for life.

Moving people into low paid, insecure jobs that leave them and their children in poverty while they struggle to balance the gaps is not an adequate solution. While the Minister speaks about the importance of tailored supports, case work and investment in child care, the change of moving lone parents onto these payments happened without the adequate supports being put in place. I have spoken on these issues previously in the House. We have had the Babies and Bosses reports and other reports with which I am very familiar.

When those reports referred to the lack of engagement they were speaking about the lack of State engagement to support lone parents. Somewhere along the way that translated into the idea that it was necessary to push lone parents themselves to step up. Many lone parents are willing to work and excited and interested about work and going back to education, but the State must improve its supports. The unfortunate issue was that the transition to the new payments took place without adequate supports being in place and we are playing catch up now. There is inadequate case work support. The activation programmes in education and employment in many cases do not reflect facts such as part-time availability, a reality for many lone parents and those on jobseeker transition payments. Perhaps the Minister would elaborate further on that tailoring of supports and case work and how she envisages it might be done to significant scale. I welcome her points about access to education.

I will now refer to the recommendations of the reports. Will the Minister address the anomalies around rent allowance? Can we move to a situation where lone parents can access back-to-education allowance and student grants together, for example? That is one proposal. There are also gaps in accessing rent allowance. I could read through the detailed proposals but that probably would not be useful. However, there is a specific proposal relating to the anomaly where lone parents in receipt of rent supplement and one-parent family payment are not eligible for Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, maintenance. How can we address that? We do not want to increase the risk of homelessness or to have people choosing between the security of a home for their children and the chance to have a better life for themselves. These concerns must be addressed.

The Minister mentioned the issue of maintenance. The policy in this area has directly disimproved the situation of lone parents. We see that in the change that occurred. Some 50% of recipients of one-parent family allowance are receiving maintenance but that drops to 36% when the child turns seven because the State no longer engages with the liable relative. In fact, we hear constantly that the pressure is put on lone parents to pursue maintenance and to show that they are doing so. In some cases where there is a court ruling that they should receive maintenance there are reductions in their payment even though they are not receiving that cash. This is a huge anomaly. There are proposals with regard to a State maintenance agency. Perhaps the Minister would outline her thoughts on how that might proceed.

The invisible lone parents are a serious concern, that is, lone parents who were made invisible by the 2012 changes. They are those with children over 14 years of age. A child is still a child at 14 years of age, as we have seen this week. Most parents give care and are concerned about their child when they turn 14. People know that different teenagers will need different care and different responsibilities. I ask the Minister to address a key recommendation in the report on the jobseeker transitional payment. That payment is a recognition that somebody might be engaging with employment or educational opportunities but is also balancing his or her work of care and other considerations. Can we not extend the jobseeker transitional payment until the child is aged 18 years rather than 14 years? At that point lone parents are put on jobseeker's allowance, the special supports they need disappear and the particular challenges they sometimes face are no longer being addressed by the system. For example, they are mandatorily required to be available full time. There might well be people who have children of two years of age who can become available full time, but the jobseeker transitional payment is a better system than moving people to jobseeker's allowance when their child turns 14 years of age. Perhaps the Minister would address that specific concern. It would allow the State to engage in support.