A bereaved TD has described her shock at planned changes to the widow’s pension which, she said, would have left her and her daughter in financial hardship had they been in place when her former husband died.
People Before Profit’s Ruth Coppinger was teaching part-time when her daughter’s father died last year.
“We were married for 14 years and had a maintenance agreement written into our separation agreement. I was reliant on that,” said Ms Coppinger.
When her former husband died suddenly,Ms Coppinger worried about their financial security without his support.
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Divorced or legally separated co-parents have been entitled to the widow’s, or widower’s, pension for almost 30 years – since the 1995 divorce referendum.
The weekly rate is up to €249.50 for those aged under 66 and €289.30 for those aged 66 and older, with increases of €50 for each dependent child under 12 and €62 for each child aged 12 and older.
“It was such a relief, financially and mentally, to know I would get the widow’s pension, that I would have that for my daughter,” Ms Coppinger said.
Planned changes, however, would see parents in her situation excluded from entitlement to the pension.
The Bereaved Partner’s Pension Bill, expected to complete its passage through the Dáil on Wednesday, will remove entitlement to the pension from bereaved co-parents with the loss of hundreds of euro a week for them and their children, according to one legal charity.
The Free Legal Advice Centres (Flac) is to brief Oireachtas members on its concerns about the Bill on Tuesday.
The new law is to give effect to last year’s Supreme Court judgment in the O’Meara case which ruled the exclusion of John O’Meara, a bereaved, unmarried father of three, from entitlement to the widower’s contributory pension scheme was unconstitutional.
It found the rules around access to the pension breached the guarantee of equality in the Constitution by refusing it to a bereaved unmarried parent with exactly the same obligations to their children as a bereaved married parent.
While the new law extends entitlement to bereaved cohabiting parents, it stipulates they must be in a committed, intimate relationship and living together at the time of bereavement.
It removes the entitlement of those who married the deceased parent of their children, but are divorced or separated from them when they die. The new law will not affect current recipients.
The existing scenario, in which divorced or legally separated co-parents are entitled to the pension, has been an “important protection” against poverty for children where the death of a parent meant the loss of maintenance, Flac has said.
Karen Kiernan, chief executive of the support charity One Family, said a “very small number” of divorced or separated people claim a survivor’s pension.
“We see no basis for removing their entitlement,” she said. “It is highly concerning that the potential financial impact ... on this group does not seem to have been considered by the Department in what is otherwise a very positive piece of legislation.”
Damien Peelo, chief executive of lone-parent advocacy organisation Treoir, said the bill risked “replacing one inequality with another” by excluding divorced or separated parents.
“Grieving children deserve equal treatment, regardless of their parents’ relationship status,” he said.
Ms Coppinger said the law would “plunge households into poverty” and could see some children facing “homelessness on top of grief” if their surviving parent could not pay their rent or mortgage.
A Department of Social Protection spokesman said the O’Meara judgment had raised “a range of complex matters.
“The Bill has been developed to ensure that the principle of equality in the treatment of potential beneficiaries is upheld both in relation to eligibility for the payment and the rules on the loss of entitlement when a relationship ends,” he said.
“The representation that this amounts to discrimination against single parents is incorrect.”
