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Joint Committee on Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth díospóireacht -
Tuesday, 23 Nov 2021

Child Poverty: Discussion (Resumed)

Apologies have been received from Deputy Costello. I ask any member or witness participating remotely who experiences sound or technical issues to let us know through the chat function. Otherwise I will proceed. As this is a public meeting the chat function on Teams should only be used to advise participants of any technical issue or urgent matter and not for general comments or statements. I remind members who are participating remotely to keep their devices on mute until they are invited to speak. When people are speaking I ask that where possible they have their camera switched on and be mindful that we are in public session.

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Our meeting this afternoon is to discuss issues of child poverty. From the Children's Rights Alliance I welcome Ms Tanya Ward, chief executive. I also welcome from Early Childhood Ireland Ms Frances Byrne, director of policy, advocacy and campaigning. From Single Parents Acting for the Rights of our Kids, SPARK, I welcome Ms Louise Bayliss, spokesperson, and Ms Gayle Smith from the steering committee on educational matters. They are all very welcome. I am delighted they could join us to discuss this very important topic.

Prior to hearing the opening statements I will go through parliamentary privilege. I advise the witnesses that as they are all appearing before the committee virtually, I need to point out there is uncertainty whether parliamentary privilege will apply to their evidence from a location outside of the parliamentary precincts of Leinster House. Therefore, if they are directed by me to cease giving evidence on a particular matter it is imperative that they comply with any such direction. We have allocated three minutes for opening statements. These will be followed by questions and answers. There will be time for people to come back in during the questions-and-answer session. We have a speaking rota, which was circulated prior to the meeting. I invite Ms Ward to make her opening statement.

Ms Tanya Ward

I welcome the opportunity to present before the committee on behalf of the Children’s Rights Alliance on the very important cross-cutting issue of child poverty. I commend the committee on its focus on child poverty.

The Children's Rights Alliance unites more than 135 members. Our goal is to make Ireland one of the best places in the world to be a child. In my opening remarks, I want to touch on several areas. These are the need for national co-ordination and implementation, as well as some specific recommendations in areas where the committee's attention could make a real difference. This is not to say there are not other areas affected by child poverty. I want to point towards some important headline issues in my opening statement.

With regard to national co-ordination and implementation, I am reminded of the importance of Tony Blair. Committee members might remember that in 1999 he famously committed to ending child poverty in the UK by 2020. He enacted a Child Poverty Act, invested in school meals and set up an early years programme called Sure Start. One of the reasons his Government had success and lifted more than 1 million children out of our measure of consistent poverty was that it established a child poverty unit in Whitehall. This was very important for driving change. In the Irish context, we do not have a comparable cross-government child poverty unit. Excellent work is being done on child poverty across the board in the Departments of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Social Protection and Education but there is no single child poverty unit. Such units are being established in other countries with national action plans on child poverty. New Zealand and Scotland are good examples. The Children's Rights Alliance believes it is important to establish such a unit, to be co-located between the Department of Social Protection and the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. It could be an important driving force behind actions to address child poverty.

We need a national action plan to address child poverty. We know the Government plans to look at this area, particularly in the context of a new national policy framework for children and young people. The Government should also think about local child poverty action plans. These could be introduced on a phased basis. This could involve local needs analysis, facilitating children and young people in this work and funding the implementation of these plans. We think that could really work in the Irish context.

As for areas that deserve special attention, I am here today with representatives from Early Childhood Ireland and SPARK. The data tell us that one of the most important areas to invest in to address child poverty is that of childcare. The Government needs to think about providing free, or nearly free, access to childcare for families on the lowest incomes. One way to make this happen is that they receive higher levels of subsidisation under the national childcare scheme. The Government should establish a cross-government working group to ensure childcare is available to low-income families wishing to attend education and training.

I know committee members are particularly interested in food poverty. This is particularly acute in Ireland because of the high cost of food due to the fact we are on the edge of Europe. The Government has an excellent hot school meals programme. This programme needs to be rolled out throughout the country in order that all children and young people get to benefit. It should go much further and include non-formal education settings and early year settings.

I want to bring the attention of the committee to areas that are often forgotten, namely, those of play, recreation, sports, arts and cultural activities. European policy in this regard is that these areas need to be considered when trying to address child poverty. There is a real need to focus on these areas. Local development plans should be proofed against child poverty. Investment should be made in walkable communities and in play and recreation facilities.

Investment in the arts, cultural events and sports is also critical to the development of children and young people. We know that it changes their horizons. It makes them feel like another world is possible and is particularly important for children living in persistent poverty.

That is my opening statement. I would be happy to answer questions about any other areas in which the committee or the Chair might be interested.

Thank you, Ms Ward. There definitely will be questions. We move on to Ms Frances Byrne from Early Childhood Ireland.

Ms Frances Byrne

Early Childhood Ireland, like our colleagues in the Children's Rights Alliance, welcomes the opportunity to present to the committee on the theme of child poverty. My main focus will be on the national childcare scheme. We also wish to bring to the attention to the committee an important issue which we believe is burgeoning and which will have a particular potential effect on disadvantaged children.

As the leading support organisation in our sector, Early Childhood Ireland welcomed the national childcare scheme from the beginning. We see it as a mechanism through which our system of childcare can be transformed to meet the needs of all young children and their families. The scheme has been described as Ireland's pathway to quality, accessible, affordable early learning and care and school-aged childcare. As members will know, it was intended that the previous childcare programmes would be replaced with a single, streamlined and more user-friendly scheme. The scheme's objectives, to improve outcomes for children and support lifelong learning, to reduce poverty, to facilitate labour market activation and to reduce the cost of childcare, are worthy. As the committee will be aware, however, the intention to bring the previous schemes under the national childcare scheme, NCS, was reversed, meaning that in some families there are children with different subsidies from one another, even though the family circumstances may have remained unchanged and the family may be in disadvantage. This is highly regrettable but, in hindsight, seems inevitable. While the policy objectives of the scheme are not dissimilar to such schemes in other jurisdictions, they are very challenging given their somewhat contradictory nature. There is in place a work-study test and a sponsorship system which, although improved in the recent budget, remains unwieldy for families and childcare providers. As members of the committee will know, it has left some families with reduced subsidies. We suggest that the Government needs to prioritise the poverty reduction objective, especially at a time when it intends increasing investment, which is very welcome. This would help the most disadvantaged families and meet the wider objective to reduce overall child poverty levels in Ireland. The mechanics of how this would work would need to be agreed but we hope that the review of the national childcare scheme will address this issue.

The second issue we wish to bring to the committee's attention is that, as many committee members will know, we operate a national information service for childcare providers for our members, and in the past few weeks, particularly since the sector reopened for the fresh 2021-22 year, we have heard of increasing numbers of baby room closures. We are monitoring this very carefully as we are concerned that there is a hidden crisis burgeoning in our sector. Our belief is that this is happening now as the Government winds back the employment wage subsidy scheme and providers are facing difficult economic decisions which were postponed by the Covid-19 pandemic. The closures themselves are of concern but this is also a key capacity metric about which no data are being collected. The issue of closures impacts every family but if we are facing into decreasing provision for very young children, that will have a particular effect on those who are disadvantaged. They may have a sponsorship agreement but not be able to find a place in an early years setting, thus reducing access to important early intervention for children. Early Childhood Ireland asks members of the committee to request that the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth begin immediately to gather data on room closures in real time and to use those data to develop a robust policy response in order that all families, especially those who are disadvantaged, may have access to quality early years care and education.

I hope I have not run over my time. I thank the Chair and the members of the committee for the invitation to present to it and thank the clerk and her colleagues for all their assistance.

Thank you, Ms Byrne. Again, I believe there will be questions. We move on to SPARK. Ms Bayliss, would you like to make your opening statement?

Ms Louise Bayliss

We thank the joint committee for the opportunity to talk to members about the issue of child poverty. SPARK is a peer-led advocacy and support group for lone parents. We offer unique insights into the lived reality of parenting alone. I am Louise Bayliss, co-founder and spokesperson, and Gayle Smith is on our steering committee. She is currently undertaking a master's in rights and social policy. Ms Smith can speak about deficiencies in the national childcare scheme which mean she currently pays over 25% of her income on childcare. She is undertaking her master's despite the barriers rather than because of the supports.

Eliminating child poverty is a key ambition of SPARK. We believe that in order to achieve this, we need honest discussions about child poverty. Children are the age group most likely to experience poverty in Ireland. The rate of consistent poverty among children stood at 8.1% in 2019 compared with 5.1% for adults aged 18 to 64 and 2.3% for those over the age of 65. Poverty among children, however, has very different patterns. Children in two-parent families have a consistent poverty rate of 6.1%, whereas children in lone-parent households have a consistent poverty rate of 17.1%. The overall figure masks where child poverty is sited. Without examining these data, real solutions cannot be found.

There have been many reports examining what is needed to lift lone-parent households and our children out of poverty. The results are consistent. We need four things: affordable housing; quality, affordable childcare; well-paid, family-friendly jobs; and enforced child maintenance. Currently, though, lone parents are at the harsh end of the housing crisis, and our children are the most likely to end up homeless or in inadequate housing. The replacement of targeted childcare schemes by the NCS has had a detrimental impact on some lone parents. The minimum wage is below a living wage and, because of childcare costs, many lone parents opt to work in low-paid jobs that can be accessed around school hours. We are one of the few OECD countries that does not have a statutory maintenance system. Many parents are forced to go to court for a child maintenance order. Once the order is issued, there is no oversight as to whether the order is complied with and the lone parent is obliged to follow up on enforcement or, as in many cases, forfeit the payment. This poor maintenance system is compounded by social welfare rules which mean that lone parents lose the support of the liable relatives unit when the youngest child turns seven. Our housing disregard was set in 1997 and, therefore, is in no way reflective of current housing costs.

Those are the overall concerns we have about child poverty. However, if time permits during the session, we would like to discuss three specific social welfare measures. First, lone parents living in independent households are not entitled to the living alone allowance, household benefits package or free travel. This means in real terms that the increase in the qualified child rate is a net payment of €7.42 for under-12s or €15.42 for over-12s. This explains why lone-parent households on social welfare face greater poverty than many other social welfare households. Second is the cliff-edge drop in payment when a parent moves to the working family payment when their youngest child turns 14. We welcomed the report commissioned on the impact of the loss of the jobseeker's transitional payment, JST, last year; however, we were disappointed that it looked only at JST claimants moving to jobseeker payments and did not examine the working family payment. Our interactive calculator, which we have submitted along with our written statement, shows clearly the loss of income. For example, a lone parent working full-time on a net income of €500 will lose over €70 a week when their youngest child turns 14, this despite the fact that teenagers are proven to be more expensive. Third, the social welfare assessment of mortgage payments paid by the non-resident parent increases the risk of homelessness, even in cases of domestic violence.

If we want to reduce child poverty, targeted supports must be directed to lone-parent households. We need the best interest of the child to be central to all Government policies. Therefore, we support the Focus Ireland campaign to end child homelessness. In two days' time, the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-based Violence begins. Not all lone parents are victims of domestic violence, but all parent survivors of gender-based violence become lone parents. A key solution to ending gender-based violence, GBV, is to offer parents real options to leave abusers. For many economically dependent parents, exiting abuse leads to poverty and homelessness, which cannot be tolerated as realistic options.

I thank Ms Bayliss. We are going to move to the questions. That will give people an opportunity to come in again. We will start with Senator Ruane.

I thank the witnesses for their presentations. I am sorry that missed the first two or three minutes of the meeting. There was a vote in the Seanad.

My questions will be directed to Ms Bayliss from SPARK, Ms Smith and the Children’s Rights Alliance. First, I would like to pick up on the point relating to child maintenance. My office has been drafting child maintenance legislation for four or five years now. It will be taken on by the women's caucus and will hopefully be tabled early in the new year. In that context, could the witnesses speak a bit about how a guaranteed State payment of child maintenance would make a difference in addressing child poverty and act as an anti-child poverty tool?

My second question is to Ms Bayliss. Has she, through SPARK, encountered instances involving women where the non-resident parent either ended up in prison or deceased? Obviously, there are no protections in any legislation for unmarried parents. If they were married, there would be a widow’s pension. There is no State support for a child who is left fatherless because of either detention or death.

Could Ms Bayliss also comment some more on part-time study? Obviously, we keep pushing women towards low-paid employment under the one-parent family system. We would be better off supporting and resourcing women to engage with education, whatever type of education it is, whether it is pursued on a part-time basis, at weekends, in the evenings or whatever. However, we do not seem to recognise anything other than full-time higher education when it comes to the likes of Student Universal Support Ireland, SUSI, supports. Could Ms Bayliss comment on how we need to address policy in that area in order that women can be encouraged towards education and can eventually access jobs that are not low paid? The latter would increase their chances of removing themselves out of poverty. As we all know, being in a job does not mean that a person is not living in poverty. Could Ms Bayliss speak about this matter, please?

I will bring in Ms Bayliss first, because many of the questions were directed to her. If any of the other witnesses want to indicate, could they please use the raise hand function? I will bring them in then. We will start with Ms Bayliss.

Ms Louise Bayliss

I thank the Senator for the questions. First, child maintenance is hugely problematic area. Ireland is one of the few countries that does not have a child maintenance system. This impacts on child poverty. Coupled with that is how child maintenance is assessed. There is no point in having a child maintenance system if the Department of Social Protection assesses it as means to reduce its social welfare bill, rather than directing the maintenance to the child. That is hugely problematic. In this country, it is even worse in than most of the countries with statutory systems. As the Senator will be aware, once there is a court order in place for maintenance to be paid, the Department of Social Protection will deduct that from a social welfare payment, whether it is paid or not. That is a huge barrier to young parents who are looking for maintenance in the courts. The second barrier to looking for maintenance is that there is no enforcement of payments. It is up to the lone parent to go backwards and forwards to court in that regard, which is demoralising and humiliating.

Linked to that was the Senator’s question about supports where a second parent is not present, either through detention or death. In current circumstances, two incomes are needed to sustain a child. When a couple are not together, there is an obligation on the other parent pay maintenance. Unfortunately, we do not enforce this in Ireland. In the case of death or detention, there is no other parent to pay it. There need to be additional supports in place in order to ensure that every child has that benefit. It is the key way of lifting children out of poverty, as I said, once the social welfare rules focus around them.

The Senator’s final question, which is relevant, was about why we support part-time work for lone parents and acknowledge their care responsibilities, but do not do it for higher education. I would like my colleague, Ms Smith, to speak about that. She has lived experience of this because she is going through it at the moment.

Ms Gayle Smith

I thank the committee for letting us speak today. Obviously, unlike the other speakers, I am not a professional. What I do bring is my lived experience as a lone parent, as well as that of having gone through returning to education as a mature student.

From the time I decided to return to education, I found that there were many barriers. The first was, as Senator Ruane has said already, that I was not given a choice to go part time. I had to go full time, because you do not get a SUSI grant if you go part time. While this can be this can be fine for many parents, for others it is not an option. If they have a couple of kids who they need to look after, or if their kids are really young, it is not an option for them to go full time. If you do go full time, you will incur extra childcare costs. When education is spread over two years, you have take that into account and ask yourself how long you will be in education. That is the way I had to look at it. When I returned to education, I was on rent supplement. You cannot be in full-time education and receive rent supplements. I had to move from rent supplements to the housing assistance payment, HAP, which meant I was financially worse off as a result. I felt that when I went back to education there was barrier upon barrier in front of me. It is only because I was so stubborn and dogmatic about it that I got through. Many women, because of their circumstances, are so worn down that they do not have the capacity,or the fight left in them to get through this. That needs to be understood.

Nobody wants to live in poverty, and nobody wants their children to live in poverty. If women are given supports to return to education and to return to work, this will bring long term benefits that can break this intergenerational cycle of child poverty. The Government should look at short-term supports for women that will help them in the long term. I am doing my masters degree. Let me put this in perspective. I did not pass my leaving certificate. I did an undergraduate degree and now I am doing my masters. I am going to finish with first-class honours. Next year, I will be free from social welfare dependency. That is the aim. The Government should look at short term fixes like this. If someone wants to return to education, the Government should say “Okay, great, how we help you? How can we support you? How can we make this happen?” It should not be a constant fight for people who are already struggling. When children see their parents going to education and getting a good job, that is inspiring for them. We really need to consider that as well.

I thank Ms Smith for sharing that story. It is inspiring for everybody. It is brilliant to hear about the lived experience. We appreciate Ms Smith being here and telling us her story. I will move on to our next speaker, Senator McGreehan.

Everyone is welcome to the meeting. I dare not say that I am enjoying listening to the speakers, because their comments are stark. It is sad to think that we are failing so many people. I congratulate Ms Smith on her achievements. They are great to hear. More power to her. As she said, however, it was stubbornness that got her there. The default should not be stubbornness to be successful. It should just be there for her.

My first question is to the Children’s Rights Alliance. I was interested in their concept of the localised childhood poverty plan. As someone who worked on it with a revitalising areas by planning, investment and development, RAPID, co-ordinator years ago, I see how looking at an area in its unique self works to improve the lives of people. I would like to know more detail about that concept. How would they see that being rolled out?

It is a good idea. From listening to one of the speakers, perhaps our committee can write to the Department and ask to find out about those increasing baby-boom numbers. It is an important aspect. As I said, we are putting up barriers to people entering education, re-entering education and entering into work. If we have no one to mind our babies, then there is another block, never mind the cost, which is an issue we are all working on constantly.

To ask a general question as well, how do the witnesses feel about individualisation in the context of looking at supports? I dare not say benefits, because they are not. We are examining supports to get families to a better standard of living. In that regard, I point to the inflexibility of all our systems, their inability to work together and the siloing of educational grants, as Ms Smith rightly said. She was not entitled to a SUSI grant because she was not going to education full-time. How far away are we from individualisation in respect of looking at the individual to enable supports to work best for the person concerned, because the circumstances of every family and every individual are different? I would like hear the witnesses' opinions on those aspects.

I will start with Ms Ward. A question was also directed to the representatives from the Children’s Rights Alliance, and perhaps the representatives of SPARK may want to come in as well. I call Ms Ward.

Ms Tanya Ward

I thank the Senator for her question. The local child poverty development plan has come from talking to our members about what kind of issues are being experienced on the ground, as the Senator said. A good example of that is the Childhood Development Initiative, CDI, in Tallaght, which has done a needs assessment regarding children living in poverty. It looked at what is happening for children in our location. Several things emerged from that undertaking. Basically, it was discovered that people living in Tallaght had what was almost the biggest gap in educational attainment in the country. That was one of the points that jumped out from the findings. It was also found, however, that while there were many green spaces for children, all the playgrounds and play areas were in bad condition. The schools in the area said they just did not have enough resources in respect of technology, schoolbooks, etc. It can be imagined, then, if we had this national local approach to addressing child poverty, that here is an area where the local stakeholders have already done an analysis of what the needs are. If they put a plan together and the Government provided funding to address some of those issues, then we can imagine some of the change that would bring about. Adopting this approach in future, and perhaps piloting it in some areas to see what the impacts would be and how much it would cost if it is going to be employed, could make a major difference.

Turning to the issue of individualisation, possibly what is at the heart of this matter is the lack of focus on child poverty and the poverty of the parents. I say that because these systems are all developed by different Departments with their own objectives and goals. If they came together with a different goal, however, the systems might be developed in a different way. We already heard from Ms Smith about how important third-level and further education is. She knows the difference that would make to her child’s life, but she has faced all these challenges and difficulties in pursuing her goal. The data already tell us this. If Professor Mary Daly, who studied at Oxford University, was presenting here before the committee, she would tell the members that the single most effective measure to lift children out of poverty is actually the provision of quality childcare and education and training opportunities to the mother. If that is what the data are telling us, then what is it not happening? There should be no barriers in this regard. If someone like Ms Smith wants to get going on her career, then she needs supports such as childcare, grants and flexibility. She should not have any of those challenges to deal with. Therefore, we must re-examine the overarching policy that is guiding some of these systems and the delivery in that context, and a child poverty frame is the best way to do that

I must leave for a Seanad vote, but I will be listening to the responses on my phone. I apologise, but I am turning off my camera to run. I thank the witnesses.

That is no problem at all. A question was posed to the representatives of Early Childhood Ireland. Does Ms Byrne wish to come in on this aspect?

Ms Frances Byrne

Yes. I hope that Senator McGreehan can hear me thanking her. It would be welcome if the committee would take on this issue. It may not look like a direct child poverty issue, but what concerns us, as I tried to make clear in our opening statement, is that we will have a situation from next September, potentially, and nobody is monitoring this, where families will have sponsorship agreements in place. As committee members and colleagues from the other organisations will be aware, that is not necessarily a straightforward thing. While those families will have sponsorship agreements, we are concerned that they may not be able to get a place. That impacts all children from all backgrounds, but obviously if these sponsorships are being given by Tusla, or whatever organisation or agency, to families because of disadvantage and if no are places available, then that obviously has an immediate as well as a long-term impact on the children concerned and their families. Therefore, the support of the committee in this regard would be very welcome.

All kinds of statistics and facts are collected weekly by Pobal on behalf of the Department concerning attendance and all kinds of things in a similar vein, and all we are asking is that providers would have a way of reporting in when they have decided to close a room. Sometimes those decisions have a positive impact. It may mean more room for toddlers, for example. However, we are concerned because no one is overseeing or monitoring that aspect and we do not have the same kind of planning for places in Ireland as exists in other areas. We have noted an increase in providers telling us that they are making these decisions, and they are making them for economic reasons. Therefore, this is not about blaming providers whatsoever. All we are saying is that if somebody was tracking that information and if the Department could then come up with a response, that would be welcome.

I know Senator McGreehan did aim this point at us, but on the question of individualisation, I completely agree with Ms Ward. We would describe it as a holistic approach. It is a different term, but we are talking about the same thing. We see it every day. This is part of quality care and education. It involves considering the whole picture of children and their families and the system needs to do that as well. Again, other countries get this aspect right, where it is seen that family support and quality childcare is required by some families more than others. Much of the time, the systems in place in those countries spark into action when a woman is pregnant and not after the child is born. There is no reason, given proper planning and investment, that we could not do the same. I completely agree that this issue should be seen through a child poverty lens.

I remind the witnesses to indicate if they wish to contribute a response to any questions. I call Deputy Bacik.

I thank all the witnesses for their presentations. I congratulate Ms Smith on her wonderful achievement as well. It is great to hear about, and I appreciate her sharing her personal story as well. It is powerful for all of us.

I also want to focus on the issue of childcare. Ms Ward put it strongly in respect of saying that the single most important metric or measure that can be adopted to bring children out of poverty is to have a quality system of childcare. We are grappling with how we can go about doing that. We heard from all the witnesses in this regard, and as Ms Byrne said, the national childcare scheme was supposed to offer a pathway to a Scandinavian model of childcare. The flaws in it, however, as identified by Ms Bayliss and Ms Smith, and by others, and highlighted by my colleague, Senator Sherlock, have really undermined its effectiveness and have made it counterproductive in many ways. We see siblings from the same family having different measures of support, etc.

What I want to do is to ask the witnesses about their view on the funding model the Government is proposing. We in the Labour Party have been putting forward the idea of a universal public childcare scheme, and the Government is moving in that direction too. The Minister recently spoke in the budget about moving to a new funding model in September. We are starting from a situation where childcare provision has a heavy reliance on private providers and the overall system is piecemeal, fragmented and complex to navigate, as the witnesses described.

How do we get to the point of a universal public childcare system? Is there a system that does what we are considering? I recently looked at Berlin childcare models, which are very interesting in that they are community run but State funded. Ms Byrne and I have discussed how we can get to the point where there would be still local engagement and local governance of childcare but also State funding. I have called for a Donogh O'Malley moment such as what was done in the case of secondary education, whereby every child would be guaranteed a childcare place that the State would pay for but that would be provided locally. I would love to hear any ideas or thoughts our guests may have from their work and experience as to how we can get to that point.

Ms Tanya Ward

As the Deputy said, childcare is critical, not only for helping parents access the workplace but also because it is the great equaliser. The large meta-studies tell us they can predict whether a child will progress to further education based on their social and emotional skills at the age of three, particularly in the case of boys. That is not always the case, but the studies tell us we need to get this part right.

The Labour Party supports a public childcare model and the funding model recommendations may push us in that direction. A few issues arise in this regard, one of which is that most countries in Europe have a public childcare model, not a for-profit-led system. In Ireland and the UK, we do have a for-profit-led system because of the gap whereby our governments did not establish a childcare system, as happened in other countries. The data generally tell us those not-for-profit approaches deliver better outcomes for children.

The question is what we should do when it comes to the Irish model and how we can get the best outcome model that other European countries have. Norway is a good example to follow in this area. It had a for-profit-led system and transitioned to a public childcare model. It developed a national scheme and services could opt in or out. Over time, services opted in, but one of the conditions of being part of that system was it was a not-for-profit model. That is something to think about. As I understand it, what the Government is recommending will be an opt-in scheme as well. It will be interesting to see how it is managed. I understand the Government will try to control the market costs through particular measures and not require choosing between for-profit or not-for-profit. It will be interesting to see how that plays out. Perhaps the same outcome can be achieved. It will be important to examine.

There is a need to have a discussion about the for-profit and the not-for-profit models. There is fantastic practice and great outcomes from many different providers, but one issue we sometimes hear about from members relates to the costs it takes to be a provider and run a local centre. The larger entities are able to do it because they are larger and can consolidate their costs, whereas the smaller programmes find it much more difficult. I would imagine that, in a move towards a national programme, we will probably need higher levels of subsidisation for some of the smaller centres to keep them open. I suspect we may need to deal with the issue of for-profit and not-for-profit.

In the area of direct provision, obviously, the country is moving towards a not-for-profit model. There is a long lead-in time and a new programme is coming, but providers are adapting. They are becoming social enterprises and changing their models. There have been other examples in Ireland, therefore, where there has been a move from a for-profit to a not-for-profit model.

Ms Frances Byrne

There was a lot in Deputy Bacik's question. There is a touch of the old joke "if I was going to Dingle, I would not start from here" about this. It is a major challenge for whatever Government in power, including the current one, and for the officials. As the Deputy described, the system is fragmented and piecemeal, even in regard to the language we use and our shared understanding. For example, we may talk about for-profit and not-for-profit, but the backbone of the sector comprises between 1,000 and 1,200 settings that are ECCE only. No fees come in. They are owned by private individuals in the sense we all know them, that is, we all have such people in our housing estates throughout the country. They are in private hands but they do not take in fees and therefore make a profit in the way we understand other businesses operate. That core group is 100% funded by the State, given ECCE is 100% funded. There are also full day care providers and some ECCE preschools that offer after-school childcare, as well as those that offer stand-alone after-school.

It is quite complex and diverse and that is a challenge. The vast majority of providers are private and their heckles go up when they hear mention of profit because they will ask, very directly, what profit we are referring to because they are not making money. Many of them have been around for 30 or more years. They have set up a service and do not see themselves as a business. It is really complicated. Because of the way the system has been set up, there will need to be a conversation as this funding model goes forward about how we are going to tackle this challenge the Deputy and Ms Ward referred to. It has become a privatised model but not necessarily a for-profit one, and it is important to say that. Of course, there are, as Ms Ward described, shareholder-led chains but they are a tiny proportion, between 7% and 8%, of the 4,500. We need to include the full diversity in the conversations and that is very challenging. I do not think anyone would have wanted the industry to be this way, including an awful lot of the providers, which have to deal with a significant degree of administration, a lack of planning and everything else.

It is absolutely the case there are problems with the national childcare scheme, particularly for families living in poverty and families in pockets of either large cities or rural areas where a childcare place just cannot be found. In such cases, if you find out you are expecting a baby, you will tell the crèche provider before you tell your cousin because you want to get the baby's name down. There are problems also with fees. Providers, too, find the scheme very difficult to grapple with, even though the intention was to ease administration, which it has done.

The bones of the Scandinavian model are there and the funding model needs to be introduced thoughtfully, trying to address the myriad issues, which will be challenging. Children must be at the centre of that and quality for children, regardless of the circumstances of their families, needs to be prioritised. That is the great equaliser in the so-called Scandinavian and Nordic models we all admire so much. In those countries, there is universal quality for children regardless of income, with all parents paying something unless they are destitute, and there are also some of the lowest levels of child poverty. Those two things go hand in hand. We all need to watch the new funding model carefully and closely - we understand the report will issue soon and go live next year - to ensure children will stay at the centre of it and that everybody who has been delivering childcare, including the 30,000 educators, will be included in that discussion, with their needs taken into consideration in the funding model.

I thank our guests. I apologise but I will have to leave presently to speak in the Chamber.

I thank our guests for their attending. Unfortunately, child poverty is one of the biggest issues in my area, although I hope that will not always be the case.

My first question is directed at our guests from the Childrens Rights Alliance. I had not been aware of the child poverty unit that was set up in Britain in 1999, so I carried out a little research on it. Will our guests elaborate on it? I understand the overall aim was to reduce child poverty and improve social justice, with a cross-departmental approach, which was welcome.

That seems to be an approach that is being asked for in an awful lot of briefs. I am Sinn Féin's spokesperson on mental health and many people say there should be a cross-departmental approach to that area, and I agree. The UK approach is underpinned by the Child Poverty Act. Is there similar Irish legislation? If not, is that something that is needed? What learnings can we take from the child poverty unity in Britain? That is my first question.

My second question is for SPARK and I will put it to its representatives now, if that is okay with the Chair. It was not in SPARK's opening statement but was in the supplementary document they provided on insecure housing and HAP tenancies. It is a big issue. Only last week, Focus Ireland had a report that said a high percentage of the rental units currently available are unaffordable for people, even when they have access to HAP. Thus, I support in theory SPARK's call for HAP rates to be increased to keep them in line with the market rates. However, that needs to be added on. There needs to be a rent freeze at the same time. Otherwise, the market will adapt and swallow up any increases in HAP and the residents will not see any benefits from it. Will SPARK outline some of the challenges people are facing in insecure HAP tenancies, especially in the context of child poverty?

I will go to Ms Bayliss first as she has her hand up and then I will bring Ms Ward in.

Ms Louise Bayliss

Just going back to the last speaker's question, which I had my hand up for, and the issue of childcare and the provision of it, many lone parents face a gap in that the hours are usually between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. Lone parents usually work in hospitality or retail meaning they are working evenings and weekends when there is no childcare available. That is a major issue lone parents face and there is no subsidy towards the cost of the childcare. For instance, I know for a fact that Ms Smith cannot avail of the national childcare scheme and must pay privately to have her child minded. That is one issue I wanted to point out.

On Deputy Ward's point, HAP is a huge issue for people in SPARK. As the Deputy is probably aware, when people go onto homeless HAP their rent is calculated based on a social housing model for year 1. In year 2, the rent can go up again but the HAP rate may not necessarily follow. It has come down to a 2% increase annually now but it was at 4%. Suddenly people were paying an additional 4% that the HAP was not meeting. That has been going on and on cumulatively. We have people who are in the same housing estate where one is paying a €90 or €100 top-up to his or her landlord out of a social welfare payment of €240 and somebody else is paying the correct payment of the social housing assessment of 12% or 15% of their income, depending on the area they are living in. That is causing huge difficulties for people. They know that if they lose that home they will likely end up homeless so they struggle to pay these massive top-ups to the landlord that are not being met by HAP. I absolutely agree with the Deputy's point that HAP and increasing HAP is not the solution. However, in the short term, as a measure for families and the children we know are going hungry at night-time so their parents can pay the HAP top-ups, we are asking for HAP to be increased to match until we can bring the market in line and bring in the other measures the Deputy mentioned like rent freezes, capping of market rents and obviously ultimately, a social housing model that works and ensures our children are in safe, secure housing at affordable rents. Until that time, the top-ups are really crucifying many of our families.

I see Ms Smith also has her hand up. Then we will move to the children's rights alliance.

Ms Gayle Smith

On the issue with HAP, I am on HAP myself through Dublin City Council. At the moment, the HAP cap for Dublin City Council - for normal rather than homeless HAP - is €1,250 or in and around that. There is no way you will get that in Dublin. Rent is in excess of €2,000 per month. I must top up what is paid to my landlord because as my rent has increased, the HAP section has told me it will not increase the payment. Also, there is no income disregard for HAP. If your income goes up because you have got part-time work, your rent to HAP would go up as well. There is also no allowance for, say, a lone parent with four kids. He or she would probably be paying the same rent as a single person. It is based on the income into the household not on the circumstances within the household. That in itself pushes many people into poverty.

Ms Tanya Ward

I thank Deputy Ward for the question. What happened in the UK was Tony Blair's Government introduced a Child Poverty Act. It required two things, namely, the British Government would have to present a child poverty action plan and establish a child poverty unit. What the unit did - it does not exist any more because the Tories did away with it - was bring together senior civil servants and researchers working across government to ensure different bits of government were introducing the kind of measures that needed to be introduced. Funding programmes were run as well. Things like poverty-proofing were also done.

We have talked a bit about the national childcare scheme. If there had been a child poverty unit, it would have done a child poverty analysis of it. It is the kind of stuff that used to happen in the past when the Combat Poverty Agency was in operation. It used to do some of that work. We think there needs to be a unit in the Government. What really strikes me at the moment when you look at the Government is that the talent is there across the Government. There are actually people with the expertise and knowledge to do work in this area but you see it being done in silos. We would like to see people being brought together. Those people are also doing this alongside other jobs. Let us say-----

(Interruptions).

Ms Tanya Ward

-----research in this area but they are leading research in many other areas as well. We think it is really important to have enough dedicated staff who are actually driving this. That has been successful because Scotland has done it. It has been very successful there. New Zealand has done it as well and it has also been successful. It is a tried and tested model and we think it needs to happen in the Irish context.

I thank the representatives.

I thank all the witnesses for coming before the committee and sharing their experiences. There are over 200,000 children at risk of poverty in Ireland and more than 90,000 are in consistent poverty. This means they do not have guaranteed access to sufficient food, shelter, healthcare and other essentials I think most of us take for granted. Those are truly shocking figures. The representatives' submissions and experiences are essential insights to help the committee understand and advocate for the change we urgently need. If I have time, I have three questions for the Children's Rights Alliance and one for SPARK.

I was struck by Ms Ward's inclusion of the concept of childproofing local and national development plans to meet the needs of young people. During the development of the county development plan for Cork County Council this year, we did a consultation with primary schools and transition years. It was a really fascinating process. It came about because we felt we did not hear enough from young people. Politicians are contacted all the time and our constituency offices are always inundated but they are always from the older populations and of course we represent the younger population too. For the most part, all the children wanted or were calling for was safe infrastructure to walk and cycle to school. They were really sensible and reasonable requests. There were some other very good ones like slides from the top of town into the sea and stuff like that. I would love Ms Ward to elaborate on this concept of childproofing and how it can be achieved. It is really important.

Secondly, we know the State spends 0.3% of GDP on early years, which is well below the European average of 0.8% and the UNICEF recommendation benchmark of 1%. Ms Ward emphasised the need to provide free access to childcare for families on the lowest incomes through the national childcare scheme for families in receipt of a medical card. Will she expand a bit more on the importance of this kind of measure?

Thirdly, she highlighted the acute nature of child poverty in Ireland, cited the school meals programme as being an important State response and rightly called for the programme to ensure all children have access to hot, nutritious meals daily in education settings.

My understanding is that this will have multiple benefits in terms of nutrition, participation in education and the behavioural impact. Will the representatives elaborate a little more on the impact it could have?

Ms Bayliss highlighted the systematic and specific issues faced by single parent families, of which we are all aware. She particularly highlighted issues around domestic abuse as we approach the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence and stated that the key solution to ending gender-based violence is to offer parents real options to leave abusers. Currently, it can be even more difficult to leave existing abusive and violent situations because of the risk of poverty, homelessness and, often, as we have learned recently, loss of citizenship, which is often linked to a partner and makes it difficult to leave abusive situations. Will Ms Bayliss suggest some actions we should put to the Departments of Social Protection and Housing, Local Government and Heritage to tackle these issues?

If I have asked too many questions, a written response is fine. I am not sure if I have enough time.

We are okay for time.

Ms Tanya Ward

I thank the Deputy. It is great to hear that a consultation happened in Cork because that is critical when doing a piece of childproofing of a local development plan. It is one of the key things that should be done.

We are seeing many countries across Europe start to do what are called child rights impact assessments. These are checklists of different things that decision makers need to think about if they are trying to make sure that their service, or local plan of delivery, is in line with the interests and rights of children. The way many companies, organisations or public authorities operate means that they are not necessarily making decisions that have the rights or best interests of children at their heart. That means resources go in a different direction. They do not go towards walkways, playgrounds, local facilities and so on that children might need in local areas. We know that the Government is exploring and thinking about how this could work. Again, it would be great to trial this on a pilot basis to get some local authorities to adopt this approach and see what recommendations and changes it could lead to.

What is interesting around the Covid piece is that Scotland did a similar analysis when it was devising its Covid restrictions. After consulting with children's groups, authorities there decided to keep the playgrounds open.

(Interruptions).

Ms Tanya Ward

It is a very important issue to explore.

On the recommendation we made for the childcare scheme, as Ms Smith mentioned, one quarter of her income was going into childcare. As we know, there are great things about the national childcare scheme, but I do not think Ms Smith should have had to experience the issue with market costs at all. If someone happens to live in a part of country where childcare is expensive, he or she will have to pay more. Someone on a low income who is accessing the scheme should not have to worry about that. The scheme should find a way to pay a higher subsidy to that person.

We have been talking to members of SPARK about the way to address this and they said that most of the people they work with have a medical card. That can be used to unlock a higher level of subsidy that would work. The medical card is used in a similar way in other child poverty areas. The medical card rates have not increased in a very long time and that needs to be addressed, but using the medical card is a way to ensure that some of the families on the lowest incomes would not have to deal with the problem of cost. That is something that could be dealt with early on before we move to a new funding model. It is something the Government could implement very quickly.

I am delighted the Deputy picked up on the school meals piece. We know that all the countries that have the best outcomes for children have hot school meals as part of the school day. It exposes children to food that is very good for them, they are more likely to eat it if it is hot and it helps families who are struggling on the breadline on very low incomes. These families are also trying to juggle work. One of the things we saw when restrictions hit and schools closed, even in programmes in Ireland at present, was that families were in crisis around food. This is an area that the Government needs to invest in.

What is amazing about it is that the pilot programmes that have already been run - the former Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Regina Doherty, initiated this piece of work and it has been followed on by the Minister of State, Deputy Joe O'Brien, and the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, at the Department of Rural and Community Development - is that the data coming back from the schools is very interesting. Staff in one school said that when children left to go to the dentist, they would previously never have come back for the rest of the day, but they came back and stayed for the full day to get the meals. Children were eating vegetables for the first time because they had no access to them at home and their families might not even have cooking facilities. Children were not cranky; they were in better form and all those things that happen. When children are hungry, they find it very hard to learn and, emotionally, they find it very hard to navigate everyday life. We know hot meal programmes really help children to learn and socialise. It is one of those areas where there is a win-win and all children will benefit. Everyone should benefit from these programmes in a very non-stigmatising way.

Ms Louise Bayliss

Domestic abuse is one of the things we are really concerned about. When we set up SPARK it was not an issue we thought would be so prevalent, but an awful lot of women approach us when they are in the midst of domestic abuse and violence and are looking at their options. They ask us what the options are for the family home, social welfare and maintenance, which we go through with them. They are always appalled because they believe they are more supported than they are when it comes down to it. I was shocked one day when I spoke to a woman - I have told this story before - who said to me that it was a case of homelessness or hospitalisation for her. She made the choice that two or three hospital visits a year were okay, if her children were not going into homelessness. I do not believe that anybody thinks that is a realistic option. When we hear the question "Why doesn't she just leave him?" that is the reason. There are no real alternatives. We know that the chances of ending up in homelessness are very high for somebody being abused.

One of the things that happened during the Covid pandemic that was very welcome was the enhanced rent supplement for victims of domestic violence. That was a very positive move, which we welcomed. It gives people an option. However, during the same period, there was a High Court ruling that all mortgage payments are now fully assessed as maintenance. That is contradictory because if someone is in a family home on which there is a mortgage, and even if the abuser has been barred from the house and there is a court order to pay maintenance, the Department of Social Protection will assess that full mortgage payment as maintenance that is going towards the children. The family can be left with no money to live on. We have heard of cases where people will forgo the mortgage being paid so that they can feed their children. That is counter-intuitive because that family will eventually have their home repossessed, go into homeless accommodation and be on HAP, which will cost much more. Very simple measures can be taken to support a family when family breakdown is happening to ensure that the mortgage is paid, but is not calculated as child maintenance leaving the family with nothing to live on. There are very simple moves like that.

Senator Ruane spoke about her child maintenance Bill. We believe that if such a Bill did not involve going back to court, it would also make a major difference. When people get away from their abuser, they do not necessarily want to go onto a combative court system to argue for child maintenance. It should be something that is taken through Revenue, where it assesses the payment that is paid directly to the parent, for all victims of abuse, but especially for families experiencing domestic abuse.

We are very concerned that when somebody escapes from an abuser, and this is again from lived experience in SPARK, there are two things that continue post separation - arguments about access and arguments about child maintenance - because these are the only two things that can be controlled. If we had that taken out of the court system, and the best interests of the child considered in maintenance and access, it would make a major difference. It would give people real options to leave abusers.

I thank Ms Bayliss for raising those issues. Sometimes it is easy to not be aware of the structural barriers across Departments. Not too long ago, the West Cork Women Against Domestic Violence Project brought to my attention that it was always the way that when somebody presented as homeless, they would go to the local community welfare officer. With the increase in homelessness cases, that responsibility has now been transferred to the local authority and, therefore, the person has to go to the local authority. For example, where I live in West Cork - and it is the same in many constituencies - there are no busses from many towns to the places these people must present to their community welfare officer. In addition, local authority staff are not used to dealing with those situations. They are not trained and they are not trauma informed, although we cannot expect them to be. There are examples in some counties, for example, Clare, where there are trauma-informed multidisciplinary teams dealing with housing. They have training in this regard to make sure that they are supporting people. One hears stories of people turning up during a very difficult time. They are trying to leave the house. They may have children with them, they may have pets, they may have luggage and they might not have transport and then they are told to find their own emergency accommodation. When they find somewhere, they might be told, “No, actually, that is too expensive”, even though it had been on the list. There are all of these kinds of structural aspects. I thank Ms Bayliss for that information. It is important that the committee hears it.

Ms Frances Byrne

I thank the Chair. Ms Smith made a point about irregular hours that Ms Ward and Ms Bayliss picked up. Some people work outside of the norm of the nine-to-five. In those cases, couples have to make difficult decisions about one parent covering day shifts and night shifts. It is difficult for those who parent alone and for their children. The national childcare scheme does not preclude that, but very few crèches in Ireland - I can think of one - that are prepared to open later.

Childminding has not been regulated. While families who use childminders are eligible to get subsidies, these childminders have to be regulated and registered. That is all coming into law. The last time we appeared before the committee we said that. The former Minister and the current Minister and the officials are aware of this, not as a flaw, but as something lacking in the current national childcare scheme. This needs to be addressed for people who are studying or working outside normal hours and, particularly, for families that are headed by a lone parent. Hopefully, we will see some progress on that in the review of the scheme. All stakeholders are aware of it. It has a particular impact on disadvantaged families, which needs to be addressed.

As Senator Keogan is having problems with her microphone, we will move on and come back to her. I call Deputy Murnane O’Connor.

I thank everyone. I was heartened by Ms Smith's excellent story.

Ireland signed up to the European Child Guarantee in June 2021. It aims to prevent and combat child poverty and social exclusion in the EU. Ms Byrne referred to the different supports. What plan do we have? We need a plan. What type of childcare centres should we have? Should they be community-based centres, co-operatives, employer-led, co-location, or should some be managed through the local childcare committee? It is important to consider that. Communication is the key here. We spoke about that earlier.

During the pandemic, the OECD noted that Covid-19 has harmed "the health, and social and material wellbeing of children" from the poorest families. Area-based childhood programmes and targeted supports are a priority in the national development plan, NDP, which was launched recently. What could be changed in the NDP where we could make a difference?

Covid-19 has played a huge part for community supports, through fundraising and through different grants for food parcels and hampers. People in the community are so good to fundraise for different causes. We have the St. Clare's Hospitality Kitchen, which is a kitchen in Carlow. It plays a huge role in helping families and children. How do the witnesses feel about this? The Government now needs to look at these supports.

Ms Smith referred to applying to the local authority for the housing assistance payment, HAP. That is a big issue. If someone works and exceeds the threshold, he or she can lose all of that payment. We need to look at that. There is no joined-up thinking.

Even yesterday, for example, the Minister for Social Protection announced additional hot school meals programmes. Carlow only got one of those. I know for a fact that children are leaving schools that do not have the hot school meals programme and they are being sent to schools that have the programme. We need to address this so that all schools have a hot school meals programme, because it is affecting schools. As well as this, parents may have no other choice but to send their children to a school where they will be fed and get their meal. Across the board, we have learned from this meeting that we need to target schools. They have a huge impact on children and their lives. They should be fed there. Every school in the country should have a hot school meals programme.

Christmas is coming now and it can be a hard time for families that do not have any money. The children are seeing all the Christmas advertisements on the television. I wonder how we can help. What supports are needed? As Ms Smith said, we need to provide supports. While they might only be for the short term, we need supports and joined-up thinking.

There has been an increase in domestic violence during the pandemic. While we have always had domestic violence, it increased during the lockdowns. In my constituency of Carlow-Kilkenny, there is no women’s refuge in County Carlow. We need to address that. We need to look at all these different supports with everyone working together. I was touched today by the stories. I thank all of the witnesses for coming. Many of the questions that I was going to ask have been asked. However, the witnesses might come back to me with some answers.

We will start first with Ms Smith, who has indicated, followed by any of the other witnesses who want to come in.

Ms Gayle Smith

I thank the Deputy for making the point about social inclusion. It is important that we do not just talk about financial poverty. We are talking about the implications it has on our children who are excluded from normal activities in society, such as after-school activities. I cannot put my daughter into after-school activities. These are normal activities, such as sports clubs, because for us that is a luxury. I do not have an extravagant lifestyle; I do not smoke or drink and I do not go out. We have a modest existence. It is things like that. It is hard because that social exclusion makes our children not feel valued. We need to remember that. We need to make them feel cherished and valued. Let us face it: we have an ageing population. That generation will be looking after us. I hope they treat us with more consideration than how we are treating them.

Ms Tanya Ward

I was struck by the points made on non-DEIS schools. The Deputy hit the nail on the head. Half of all children living in poverty are not in DEIS schools. The majority of children living in poverty are in rural Ireland. This is because incomes in rural areas are lower. One of the things we really need to think about in the national and local approaches is the balance between urban and suburban areas and rural Ireland. Children and young people are missing out on some of the national programmes that have been introduced. It has definitely happened with regard to family support. There are some great family support programmes under the area based childhood programme being managed by Tusla. We have spoken about how this will need to be made mainstream. Children outside urban centres need to be able to access these types of family support measures.

I would love to see a focus on the DEIS model. It is a very important model for getting extra resources to areas in the country that need them. Half of all children in poverty are not in DEIS schools. Principals and teachers tell us that because there is no home-school liaison officer they are doing huge amounts of work late into the night trying to help families. Perhaps families are experiencing homelessness and they are trying to find a house for them. There are issues such as this. A home-school liaison officer would be able to do this work for the teachers who can then focus on their day job. They also say they do not have extra budgets for anything. If a child arrives in dirty clothes, there is nothing there. There are no extra uniforms. They do not have an extra budget they might have if it was a DEIS school. We need a more flexible approach to children living in communities where the DEIS programme does not exist.

Ms Frances Byrne

I welcome Deputy Murnane O'Connor's recognition of the difficulties and complexities. It is very important that elected representatives are aware of this. One of the advantages of the Irish system is that people still live in their communities and witness it. Speaking exclusively about childcare provision, there is a straightforward answer but it is not simple. We remain the lowest investor in the OECD in early years. There are very complex issues to be sorted out, of course, and I do not mean to be disrespectful to other countries or ourselves when I say this but other countries have shown us that it is not rocket science if we take the right approaches and prioritise children. What attracts us all to the Scandinavian model is that it gets the balance between universal and targeted correct.

Early Childhood Ireland regrets some of the negativity about the national childcare scheme even though it is entirely understandable. It does have the beginnings of the solutions to the problem. We need buy-in throughout society, exactly as Ms Smith said. Not to be cynical, and I know Ms Smith was not for one minute being cynical, but the children of today are paying for the pensions of tomorrow. They are the taxpayers of tomorrow. Everybody pays tax, whether they are disadvantaged or well off. We need to have this buy-in. This is what works in Scandinavian countries. People know the safety net is there for everybody. Childcare is important and seen as a part of it. If all children are availing of it and all families are paying into it and benefitting from it then it is not controversial. Here, we are stuck in the mindset of speaking about, quite understandably, means testing and disadvantage. It is very hard to grapple with. Other countries have solved these problems or are solving them. We need to look to them.

For Early Childhood Ireland the key piece is the combination of universal and targeted measures so that every child has rights and all of us collectively as a society invest in them. For the children the Deputy described so eloquently, who from time to time or throughout their childhood need extra support, it must be there for them. Because of where we are starting in Ireland it will be a difficult journey. With the announcements for budget 2022, provided that we get the complexities right, we are starting to move in the right direction and this is very welcome.

I missed a lot of the opening statements because I was in the Seanad. My sincere apologies. I heard Ms Smith speaking. She is a wonderful role model and advocate for others. Her story needs to be told a lot more. Although she had to fight hard to get to where she is, she has managed to do so. There are barriers there but Ms Smith was able to break them down.

I am very much aware of child poverty in this country. I work a little with and know a little about the work done by KS Food Appeal in the midlands. Some of the testimonies online are heartbreaking. They are from children with regard to going hungry or their parents going hungry without food on their table. These are real stories and children are in poverty every day. They go to school hungry and probably come home to one meal a day on the table. Food poverty is extremely real in this country. People would want to believe it.

My questions may have answered it already. The representatives from SPARK spoke about examples of what they consider to be a model statutory maintenance system from an OECD country. To which country and model were they referring? Is there a model that is best practice which operates in other countries but which we do not have? Perhaps this has already been answered and I missed it. If so, I apologise.

Ms Louise Bayliss

The maintenance review group is chaired by Judge Catherine Murphy. We have all fed into it and we are very grateful that she is doing the review. No country has a perfect system but there are countries that have better systems and at least they have a system. We have no system. We purely rely on the court and it is not the right area for it.

In Austria, New Zealand and many Nordic countries, the amount is assessed based on income revenue. The state pays the maintenance and then recoups it from the debtor. The parent is kept out of it completely. New Zealand and Australia have a system based on the involvement of the parent. This encourages greater parent-child contact. If the non-custodial parent has the child for 100 days a year, which is most weekends, he or she pays reduced maintenance compared with a parent who walks away completely. This is a very good system. However, I will put a caveat here. The only fear is that we would hate to think a child is being dragged away just to reduce the amount of maintenance.

Ms Byrne has made the strong point that we are in a childcare system that is piecemeal. It was allowed to develop and we are on a long path to find something good. In one sense we are at the opposite with maintenance because we have no maintenance. We are at ground zero. We are in a greenfield. We can look at other countries that have gone through the system and made their mistakes. I hope Judge Catherine Murphy's review will state we need a child maintenance system. Then we can do proper research and take the good parts from other jurisdictions and use the mistakes made and lessons learned and have a very good system. This is my hope. We have spoken to Scotland, Northern Ireland and even Australia. We have spoken to various jurisdictions.

None of them is perfect, but they are all better than what we have.

Okay. Regarding the support Tusla can offer to families in difficulty, do many families contact Tusla for such family support, or are they afraid to get in touch with that organisation?

Ms Louise Bayliss

Yes, they are terrified. It is one of the big fears. In our SPARK group, as soon as Tusla is mentioned, people say “direct away, direct away” and to not look to it for support.

Ms Louise Bayliss

In my professional life, I tell people to use Tusla and that the organisation is not there to take their children from them. The narrative does exist, however, that once Tusla gets involved in a family, it is very hard to get out. Therefore, most families would not welcome Tusla involvement, even though it can sponsor a child to get extra childcare and supports and sponsor cultural activities. Mention Tusla, though, and people believe there will be an intrusive involvement with the family. On the ground, people avoid it like the plague.

That is a shame to hear. I am disappointed to hear it, to tell the truth. I know of several families that are getting family support from Tusla. The children are still with them and the agency is supporting those families and trying to keep them together. Tusla is supporting those families financially to ensure the children do not go without.

Turning to the issue of maintenance, as a peace commissioner, women often come to me to sign the court orders seeking that fathers be brought back into court because they are not paying the maintenance. We must deal with this issue and, as was said, have some sort of a system where the maintenance support payments could be taken out directly, whether by Revenue or by whatever means. Ultimately, this issue is all about the children and that is what it must be about. It is not about scoring any goals against ex-partners or whatever. It is about the children and ensuring they are cared for. I thank the representatives of SPARK for all the work they and their organisation do with struggling lone parents and children. Many children are struggling now. I also refer to the work done by SPARK on domestic violence and with the women going through those exceptionally difficult times. I thank the witnesses for their contributions today.

I thank Senator Keogan. We are coming to the end of the questions. I will give everybody the chance to make concluding remarks, if they wish.

I want to make some points first. They are more observations than questions. I was delighted to hear childminding being mentioned because it is true not everybody has a 9 to 5, Monday to Friday job. Many lone parents who do not have such jobs fall into that category, and trying to access childminding or childcare is a constant battle or juggling act for many people. It is frustrating we are still talking about this issue. In so many ways, indeed, it is only now coming to the table. Access to quality and affordable childcare is of course one of the key ways of getting out of poverty. It is also excellent for children on so many levels, not just from an academic point of view concerning school readiness but socially and everything in that regard. Kids tend to love going into crèche, where they are in a positive crèche environment. Childcare, therefore, is excellent for children, but it also plays a key role in respect of removing people from poverty. I feel we have been talking about this issue for a long time, but I hope there will be positive changes and that the new funding scheme will result in proper access. There is an issue with capacity in this context, and that issue was touched on as well by the representatives of Early Childhood Ireland. There are not many baby spaces. That is not the only issue, and there are problems with capacity throughout the country.

The other point I wish to make concerns housing and domestic violence. I find that at times there is such a disconnect in this area. I refer to when it is necessary for people experiencing domestic violence and who finally make that decision, which it is not easy to do, to try to leave the situation they are in and then they are met with a whole heap of forms. The questions to be faced can include being asked to provide proof that no property is owned and similar queries. It leaves me wondering how on earth that can be helpful to anybody. Surely there is a way of dealing with these situations where that aspect does not have to be resolved immediately. I say that because what I see all the time are cases where women just go back to those situations. It is happening now especially, because it is so difficult to find a rental property, harder again to find a place that will accept housing assistance payment, HAP, and harder again then to find a place within the HAP limit. A great number of barriers exist for people in those situations.

The point was made about the rent allowance payments during Covid-19 and this must be examined. We had representatives from Focus Ireland in with us two or three weeks ago speaking about this same issue of child poverty. There are situations where the perpetrators of domestic violence are staying in homes. I understand that in the short term it is necessary for women and children to leave the home, but it does seem unfair that perhaps two or three years later they are the ones getting HAP on a housing waiting list while the perpetrator is sitting in a three-bedroom property. It is not always popular when I say that, but it is an aspect I feel strongly about.

Turning to the issue of maintenance support, the other thing many people also do not realise is that maintenance payments only date from when people go into court to apply for it. There is no backdating in that regard. Again, and especially in the context of domestic violence, the last thing somebody coming out of that kind of situation needs to face, given how much they already have to deal with, is a requirement to face the perpetrator and seek child maintenance. Yet, there is no backdating in the system. That is another issue I wish to highlight.

We support many of the points made in the opening statements and in the answers given to the members of the committee. I thank the witnesses not just for coming in today but for their work. We are glad to be able to have this topic on the agenda. We realise the important work all the witnesses and their organisations are doing, constantly trying to struggle and juggle on small budgets to highlight these issues. That does not go unnoticed and certainly not by this committee.

If the witnesses would like to make any closing remarks or to add anything before we finish, I invite them to do so now. We will start with Ms Ward and then move around all the witnesses.

Ms Tanya Ward

I thank the Chair. We are delighted the committee has focused on child poverty. The questions from members show they all have a good sense of the challenges and issues. If we can support the committee in any way in future, we will be delighted to do so. One thing mentioned by one of the members concerned the EU child guarantee. Something the committee might think about in future is keeping an eye on the implementation of that measure. The Government will be submitting an action plan to enable it to draw down funds from the European Social Fund, ESF, at 5%. That provides an opportunity for the whole of Government to do many different things to try to address the issues faced by our most vulnerable children. To date, the Irish Government has been the most active and present in the EU discussions in this area and it is brilliant to see that. If the committee were to focus on the ongoing implementation of the Government’s work in this area, that could make a big difference in encouraging Departments across the board to allocate funds to run initiatives to help the most vulnerable children in the country.

I thank Ms Ward. Would Ms Bayliss or Ms Smith like to contribute?

Ms Louise Bayliss

I will come in and Ms Smith will follow. I thank the committee for this engagement and for the questions, which showed the members read our submissions and are taking these issues seriously. I appreciate that. This is something close to our hearts. I think everybody feels that about child poverty. When talking about this issue, it is a disgrace when we think that 17.1% of children in lone parent families are living in poverty. We must address this situation urgently. We hear the headline rate of 8.8% of children living in poverty, but what we should really be doing is drilling down into that figure and stating that 17% of children in lone parent families are living in poverty. That is where poverty is situated and that is where we need the targeted supports to go. However, we want all children lifted out of poverty, obviously.

Ms Gayle Smith

I thank the committee for the opportunity to speak today and for all the questions from the members, which were relevant. I reiterate that if we move away from the conditionality around certain benefits and supports and make these supports and services more accessible, that will benefit children and their families in the long run.

Ms Frances Byrne

I thank the Chair and the members of the committee. I echo what colleagues have said. This is a welcome opportunity. Early Childhood Ireland is delighted that members of this committee and the former committee of which the Chair was a member really understand what Ms Ward has described as the great enabler, which equality in early years care, education and after-school care, including childminding, can be for all children. Hopefully, when we write in to formally thank the committee, we will request the Chair to raise the issue of monitoring closures in real-time in order to get some data and to look at the reasons behind the closures so that a policy response can be developed by the Department in conjunction with stakeholders such as this committee, our organisations and others.

I thank SPARK, the Children's Rights Alliance and Early Childhood Ireland for being with us today. We look forward to ongoing engagement with them. Do members agree that the opening statements will be published on the Oireachtas website? Agreed.

The joint committee adjourned at 4.41 p.m. sine die.
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