Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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Question 131: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs if her attention has been drawn to the fact that maintenance orders are not being enforced by the courts; and the estimated costs to the Exchequer arising from an associated rise in the cost of one parent family payments in view of the fact that many will no longer be reduced by part of the value of the maintenance payment. [8906/10]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The one-parent family payment acts as a safety net for people caring for children on their own, who receive inadequate maintenance, where maintenance payments are irregular, or where efforts to secure maintenance in the first place fail. Applicants for one-parent family payments must satisfy the department that they have made reasonable attempts to obtain such maintenance. They are also required to make ongoing efforts to seek adequate maintenance from their former spouses, or, in the case of unmarried applicants, the parent of their child.

Since the introduction of the one-parent family payment there have been substantial improvements in the rates of payment and in the assessment of means for the payment. One-parent family payment claimants are allowed to retain 50% of any maintenance received without reduction in their social welfare payment. They also have a disregard in respect of rent or mortgage payments up to a maximum of EUR 95.20 per week.

The number of one parent family payment recipients being paid by the Department at the end of January 2010 – the date for which the latest figures is 90,156.

Of the Determination Orders issued by the maintenance recovery unit of the Department in 2009 72.5% of the liable relatives were already contributing to the lone parent. However, many recipients may be in receipt of maintenance while still qualifying for the maximum rate of one parent family payment as a result of the provision allowing one parent family claimants to retain 50% of any maintenance received.

There is no loss of income incurred by one parent family payment recipients where the Department has to pursue the issue of maintenance with the liable relative. Rather, as mentioned above, the provision allowing one parent family claimants to retain 50% of any direct maintenance received was established as an incentive to lone parents to seek agreement with the other parent on the level of maintenance to be paid.