Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The answer the Minister has given, with respect, is simply to say exactly what I have said. She has told us what the policy is but the point is the equality issues. She mentioned that only 5% of claimants are receiving a qualified adult payment but how many are receiving qualified child payments? It would be useful to have that percentage in order to be clear on the number of persons who receive qualified child payments as part of their jobseeker's payment at the moment. They are the people for whom it will not make sense to get this pay-related payment. We have a situation where most of our social protection is not individualised, although there is a case for individualisation in certain areas. We do not individualise when it comes to means testing for the carer's allowance, for example. We do not individualise when people are giving care and take account of the fact that they do not have an income because they are caring. We count their partner's income in that context. We do not individualise for something like means testing for carers, where it would have a real impact. It affects financial independence because carers are told that because someone in their household is earning money, there will be no money in respect of them and they effectively become dependent on another household member. They do not have access to independent income to do the work that they are doing which supports the State. We do not individualise there but we are individualising here, in this very narrow space. We have to ask who is impacted by this. Actually, the people who are impacted by the lack of individualisation when it comes to something like carer's allowance are in the same position as those who are impacted by the fact that their household's needs will not be reflected in this pay-related payment.

Of course people do better if they get a higher payment. It is great to get €450 instead of €200. It is great to be getting a higher income but we have to ask questions in the context of the State's resources and particularly the obligation on the State to gender- and equality-proof its policies. We must bear in mind that all of our measures are meant to be gender- and equality-proofed. We must ask not whether a policy is a nice thing but whether it is the best thing. In that context, there is a question about those who are in households that rely on the top-up that comes from qualified child payments. I acknowledge that qualified child payments do incredible work. There have been increases in the rates of such payments which I have praised the Minister and others for because they are really important. The payments acknowledge that when people have 13-year-olds or 14-year-olds, it costs money. However, if we have a situation where a better payment is going towards certain categories of workers, we must gender-proof and equality-proof that. All of our money is being pooled together but is everybody paying into the fund so that single workers in higher income brackets can have a better percentage of their previous salary and can continue with their lifestyle while households with two, three or four children are told to apply for the means-tested jobseeker's allowance because the pay-related benefit does not make sense for them? Are we saying that some people - families in this case - can manage on less whereas other people need to have their lifestyle maintained? It goes against the logic that is used in much of the narrative around this pay-related benefit. Originally the idea of higher replacement rates was something to be applied in the context of something like parental leave because it would encourage a smoother transition when families are going through life changes. However, by making this into an individualised payment, we are in danger of creating an inequality and a dynamic where we end up with a two-tier social welfare system. That is a danger that needs to be addressed. It is a fundamental problem.

On the second amendment, it is not the case that it is only when people move off jobseeker's transitional payment that they can engage with Intreo. Jobseeker's transitional payment requires engagement when people's children are aged from seven to 14. There is already contact with Intreo. People can be on the jobseeker's transitional payment and apply for the back-to-education scheme or for training. All of that is available to people on the jobseeker's transitional payment, as it should be, but the difference lies in the requirement for full-time availability. The Minister mentioned the working family payment which is payable for up to 38 hours per fortnight. However, the legislation governing jobseeker's allowance requires people to be available, not for 38 hours in a fortnight, but for 80 hours. That is what is required.

I want to double back on that earlier change in section 15 for a moment. Let us say a person's case gets sent up to a company like Turas Nua, or one of the others, which is just clocking through its numbers. Turas Nua does not see a jobseeker with a 14-year-old child at home. It has to get as many people into full-time employment as it can; that is its job.It might state Tesco – I should not pick out a company – is offering a job of 40 hours per week shelf-stacking or whatever and you are asked to take one. If you say you cannot, it can say you are not engaging, and then your payment gets cut. That is a circle. We will all end up hearing the anecdotes and affected people will end up in our constituency clinics. The point is that this is set up to happen given how the legislation and the parameters are currently framed. Of course, people end up having more hours worked because they have to have more hours worked to get their payments. To say the system is successful because people are working more hours is a tautology as they are required to work more hours. In fact, we do not know whether this is right for every household. Will a mother end up feeling she had to take a job with shifts that did not suit, meaning she did not have contact with her child in the evenings when there was no other parent at home? The Minister did not address the fundamental inequality between two-parent households and one-parent households in terms of who is there for teenagers.

I thank the Minister for her engagement. We have had constructive engagement on other issues over the years but I feel the issues under discussion are fundamental gender and equality issues that need to be addressed, that are still not being seen by the system and that have genuine impacts on people's lives.