One-parent family payment reforms 'discriminatory'

GOVERNMENT PLANS to reform the one-parent family payment will face a legal challenge because the proposal discriminates against the children of unmarried women, the Dáil has been warned.

Kathleen Lynch (Labour, Cork North Central) said she thought Irish society had moved beyond such discrimination, especially at a time when it was proposed to have a children’s referendum to protect the rights of the child.

She said the Minister proposed to introduce “a provision that will give rise to an element of discrimination relating to how certain children enter the world and which will influence how they progress in life. A distinction is being made in respect of the relationships relating to one type of child and another type of child.”

She said the proposal would create a situation where “if I am a widow and have a child in education” she would “be in receipt of the dependant element of my payment until he or she reaches the age of 22. If, however, I have a child and am in a relationship but am not married and if I am deserted, abandoned or if my partner dies, my child will only receive the payment until they reach the age of 13.”

Ms Lynch added: “Apart from the marital status of their mothers, what is the difference between the two children to whom I refer? I am frightened by the fact that we appear to be reintroducing this concept of difference and I am sure it will be successfully challenged.”

Ms Lynch was speaking during the Dáil debate on the Social Welfare Bill introduced yesterday by Minister for Social Protection Éamon Ó Cuív. He said the Government believed the current arrangement by which a lone parent receive one-parent family payments until their child reached 18, or 22 if in full-time education, “without any requirement to engage in employment, education or training, are not in the best interests of parents, children or society”.

He said that “despite improvements” made to the payment and significant spending on supports to lone parents, a large proportion “are still experiencing poverty. The child of a lone parent is four times more likely to be in consistent poverty than the population overall. In general, the best route out of poverty is through employment.” The department had done a comprehensive review of the one-parent family payment and “developed proposals which are designed to prevent long-term dependence on welfare and facilitate financial independence”.

From next year the one-parent family payment will be made until the youngest child reaches 13 for new recipients, and this would not affect them until 2024. “For existing recipients there will be a tapered six-year phasing out period” so the cut off would come into effect in 2016. “For existing recipients, the cut-off point of 18 years will remain for 2011 and 2012. In 2013 it will be 17 years, in 2014, 16 years, in 2015, 15 years and in 2016, 13 years.”

Fine Gael social protection spokeswoman Olwyn Enright warned that the changes would have a “profound effect on people’s lives”. She said “they are being proposed without the back-up of the necessary supports to implement the changes. These supports are vital if we are to lift people out of poverty and into meaningful employment. There is a key contradiction in the way the Minister is planning to implement some of the proposals.”

She said “jobseekers are to be given the option of a course, a job or training. With good cause, they can refuse to participate and their payment will remain the same. The one-parent family recipient, on the other hand, is cut off regardless of any factor once the youngest child reaches the age of 13. That is very different.”