Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

She is absolutely gorgeous and I am utterly besotted with her so I can only imagine how happy and thrilled both of them are. She is just fantastic. I want to raise the issue of what the National One Parent Family Alliance has been saying in the run up to the cost-of-living measures announced today. The alliance highlights, as it always does, how one-parent families are disproportionately affected by poverty and deprivation. It is calling for a huge package of measures. Some of the specific measures it would like to have seen, and we should certainly bear in mind, included the extension of the fuel allowance for families in receipt of the working family payment. That is a very targeted measure. It was also calling for an increase in the qualified child allowance for those under 12 by €5 and by €10 for those over 12 to match the cost of raising children and prevent an increase in child poverty. The estimated cost for that was about €110 million. For anyone who is wondering, the One Parent Family Alliance is an alliance of civil society organisations which are concerned about the high levels of poverty experienced by lone parents and their children. These calls are supported by Barnardos, the Children's Rights Alliance, FLAC, the Family Resource Centre, the National Women's Council, One Family, SPARK, St. Vincent de Paul and Treoir. It was calling for an extension of the fuel allowance to families in receipt of the working family payment and increasing the qualified child allowance for those under 12.