Terry Brennan (Fine Gael)
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Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire.

Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail)
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The purpose of this Commencement matter is to ask the Minister to outline the specific initiatives the Government plans to implement to promote and support married families and the objective of addressing child poverty. I was prompted by comments made by the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs at the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child where he said that children who grow up in households where parents are effectively precluded from paid work will struggle to be included in mainstream society in any meaningful way. We know that household joblessness can lead to the transmission of poverty from one generation to the next. Good social policy and a strong expression of children's rights give every child the opportunity to realise their full potential. Obviously, we know from our own experience, as politicians, and from all the studies carried out that lone parents - often the mother who struggles and makes a lifetime of sacrifices to rear the child, often without any support from the father - have more challenging, economic and social issues during their life because of that experience.

I am also prompted by the Minister's comments with regard to reducing the waiting time for a couple seeking divorce to be reduced. This does not fit well with other comments the Minister has made with regard to the importance placed on marriage. I think the position is that a couple must be living apart for four out of the last five years. In this regard, there is a necessity to underpin marriage.To some extent it is surprising that two people, a man and a woman, might come together when young, fall in love, get married and spend their lives together. It is a bit of a phenomenon in its own way. It is a bedrock to society when this happens. In the Western world there has been an increasing propensity for separation and divorce but in this country only approximately 250,000 people are separated or divorced. The Minister might correct me if I am wrong. We have not had the level of divorce and separation that we have seen in other countries and we should try to preserve that level.

The studies I mentioned are very interesting and I presume the Minister or her officials will examine them. I just picked the one from Pennsylvania State University, whose scholars began the inquiry conscious of decades of research, producing evidence that parental divorce is negatively associated with offspring outcomes from early childhood through adolescence and into adult years. It indicates that children who experience parental divorce before age seven, for example, manifest significantly more behavioural problems at age 11. It is a good and balanced report. The report of the Swedish university is quite interesting as it is research from a number of years back. It indicates that during the 20th century, divorce rates have increased substantially in most cities in the Western world and it has been demonstrated that parental divorce is associated with several negative outcomes in children. The research has demonstrated that children who experienced parental divorce generally reported lower psychological well-being than children from intact families. The report also demonstrates that a cohort of women in their mid 50s coming from families of divorced or separated parents experienced greater challenges in that area when compared with those who came from intact families. One finding illustrates that contrary to expectation, data do not show that the association between parental divorce in childhood and psychological problems in adulthood diminish significantly over time. Particularly in the challenging times in which we live, society as a whole needs to try to underpin the importance of initiatives to preserve, support and incentivise this bedrock of society.

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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I am pleased to have the opportunity today to outline the Government's policy on support for the marital family and on provision for divorce and separation in the context of family breakdown. The Senator is aware that there are very substantial legal protections and recognition for the family based on marriage at both constitutional and statutory level. These are recognised not only in our family law code itself but also in our tax codes and in a variety of State benefits provided to spouses. The State recognises the value of a stable and loving marital family and the immense benefits that it brings to society as a whole, particularly to the children of the family. However, it is a sad fact that serious marital differences may arise and cannot always be addressed other than by separation or, ultimately, divorce. The Irish people decided in 1996 that there should be constitutional provision for divorce in cases of irretrievable marital breakdown. However, as the Senator noted, it is interesting that 20 years later, our divorce and judicial separation rates remain low by international standards. Annual rates of divorce and separation also appear to be relatively stable, which I welcome. The data would not suggest a significant upsurge in demand for divorce in this country, and as the Senator indicated, that runs contrary to what is happening in many other places.

The State undertakes a series of initiatives to support couples experiencing marital difficulties. It continues to fund both marriage counselling services to assist couples in rebuilding their relationships, which are very important, along with mediation services. There is much potential for mediation and I would like to see that service developed. The mediation Bill is very close to completion and will be very important. Many people are interested in seeing the development of that mediation service around the country.

Where the relationship has broken down and the parties seek separation or divorce as the only viable option, mediation can also assist in reaching agreements on the terms of the separation or divorce, helping to reduce parental conflict. I am familiar with many studies in the area and if we can reduce that level of conflict, no matter what the couple decide to do with respect to the conflict, there will be beneficial effects for children. As the Senator rightly highlighted in the studies, we know that conflict in the home - marital or otherwise - has detrimental effects on children. We need to do everything we can to help with difficulties if parents are staying together and if they are separating, we must help them to do so in a way that would have least impact on the children. It is vital to maintain the best interests of the child. The Children and Family Relationships Act 2015, key elements of which I commenced on 18 January 2016, provides a new statutory framework to consider the best interests of the child and allow the views of the child to be taken into account, whether directly or through a report by a child's views expert.

The question of income was raised by the Senator. It is clear that post-divorce, many families will suffer some reduction in income. There are many supports available, as we know, including the one-parent family payment, family income supplement or the back-to-work family dividend. With regard to the reports mentioned by the Senator, it is difficult to transpose their findings directly to the Irish context and we have limited research in this country at this point. I have no doubt that there will be more in the years to come on the impact of divorce on children. We have the first wave of data from the Growing up in Ireland study and information on separated families became available in 2014. There was a discussion in the document about the impact of the parental marital status. The authors of the report indicated there are "important implications for policies which promote marriage as the key to child development as it appears that much of the benefits of marriage are not related to marriage ... but to the socioeconomic background of mothers". That is an interesting point in the Irish context.

The Government has undertaken a series of reforms of family law to respond to the positions of families across a range of situations, reflecting a very broad commitment to supporting families, which is very important. Marital breakdown and divorce are realities of modern Irish life and there is a right to divorce enshrined in our Constitution. We need to ensure that any negative impacts on the children are mitigated as much as possible.

The Senator mentioned child poverty and the best way out of poverty is to have a job. This Government's focus on the creation of jobs and supporting families is clearly one of the best ways of challenging poverty. We have had success in the creation of more jobs and there has been a very high number of jobless families in this country, both marital and non-marital. That puts enormous stress on people. The focus on economic recovery and jobs is very significant, not just with respect to a family's material position but also in a psychological aspect.

Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for her response. Joblessness is certainly an issue and, unfortunately, it is often a consequence of divorce and separation. One of the partners - it is usually the woman with children, especially if she has worked in the home - may find it difficult to cope financially. The problem is that the cycle must be broken. As the Minister correctly stated, children of jobless people or those in poverty are more likely to end up in poverty and jobless. The issue must be tackled.

The reports indicate that even where there are no financial issues for children and they are not affected by poverty, there is a mental scar nonetheless. I know about the constitutional right to divorce and the Minister correctly indicated that if there is a large conflict between the married parties, keeping them together would not be a panacea for themselves or the children. That is a reality. Where young children are involved, it particularly behoves us to try to encourage couples to go for counselling and repair the relationship that may have broken down. We should assist them as long-term consequences for children come into play if they break up.I have always held the view that once a person marries, he or she has a responsibility, in particular, to his or her children and partner. People should strive to fulfil that particular obligation for as long as possible.

On counselling, it is important that services are improved and increased. We should try to maintain Ireland's position in being well below international levels of marriage breakdown and seek to be a leader in this regard. From a purely fiscal point of view, the cost to the State and the taxpayer of marriage breakdown is astronomical, be it in social housing provision, providing social welfare benefits or dealing with consequent behavioural problems that may arise as a result of marriage breakdown or divorce and children not having a father or a mother involved in their upbringing. I encourage the Minister and her successor to do everything they can to ensure best practice in this regard is followed in this country.

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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We need to continue to increase the supports available to families and counselling services. The development of high quality universal services in child care can and will be extremely supportive of families. Anything that reduces the pressures on individuals and families will be of benefit to the lives of children. We must do all we can to improve people's economic circumstanes, but that is not to suggest this is a panacea to the problem because people can still have difficulties, even if there are no economic issues involved. However, economic circumstances have been an extra pressure on families in recent years. Continuing to focus on economic recovery and job creation will be of great support to families because the stresses associated with unemployment are a huge factor in accelerating the pressures that can lead to marriage breakdown.