LONE PARENT households are up to 10 times more likely to be living in consistent poverty than other households, according to a study presented to the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) today.
Exclusion from the labour market through unemployment, retirement or ill-health also greatly increases a person’s chances of ending up in poverty, the research by Chris Whelan of the UCD sociology department and Bertrand Maitre of the ESRI shows. Poverty levels among those excluded from the labour market are over 25 times higher than among those at work, they found.
Being a lone parent greatly increases an Irish person’s chances of ending up in poverty but the same is not the case in other European countries. In Finland, for example, the odds of a lone parent being in poverty are only slightly higher than for the wider population.
The researchers say Ireland represents the “worst-case scenario” in relation to outcomes for people in lone parent households, with the highest levels of consistent poverty of the seven countries included in the survey.
Last week, the Government announced plans to restrict lone parent benefits by stopping payment once the youngest child reaches 13. Under the current system, they are payable until the child reaches 18, or 22 if in full-time education. Socialist Party MEP Joe Higgins said yesterday the change was a recipe for driving thousands of families into further poverty.
Mr Whelan and Mr Maitre said Ireland does badly on European poverty league tables, but our rates were comparable to other countries when only working people or those “enjoying a favourable situation in relation to marital and parental circumstances” are considered.
“However, where labour market exclusion or lone parenthood is involved, Irish individuals find themselves at a substantial disadvantage,” according to their paper. Improving Ireland’s relative position on international poverty tables would require a reduction in the number of people excluded from the labour market and a reduction in the “negative consequences” associated with such exclusion and with lone parenthood. “Since the former objective is unrealistic in the short to medium term, it becomes even more important to address the consequences of such exclusion and lone parenthood for poverty and social exclusion.”
Less than 1 per cent of people in full-time employment were found to be below the poverty threshold, compared to 30 per cent of people where the person in the household was unemployed.
Pat Carey, Minister of State at the Department of Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs, said the level of poverty among lone parents and the unemployed had improved significantly since 2006. The challenge was to maintain the progress made and to protect the most vulnerable in the economic downturn. He said the country was beginning to see the benefits of the “bold, imaginative and decisive” economic measures taken by the Government over the past 18 months.
EU POVERTY RATINGS: HOW IRELAND FARES
DEFINITIONS OF poverty excite almost as much controversy as actions to deal with the problem. Five different measures of poverty are used in the EU, and Ireland fares poorly on all of them.
Some 18.5 per cent of Irish households are “at risk of poverty”, which is defined as the percentage of households below 60 per cent of national median income. That put us 17th out of 26 countries on the 2006 figures
Some observers called into question the accuracy of this measure of poverty, which remained stubbornly high through the boom, and higher than in many eastern European countries. Partly as a result, more use was made of “consistent poverty”, a measure that took into account not only income threshold but people’s deprivation in relation to basic goods and services.
Ireland’s consistent poverty rate is lower than the “at risk” measure, at 8.7 per cent, but we still only rank 21st. More recently, a person’s income and/or level of deprivation is compared against EU, rather than national, levels.
Ireland fares slightly better under this approach; the number of households at risk of poverty, when this is defined as an income below 60 per cent of the EU median income, is 9.9 per cent, and we rank 13th.
On the measure of EU consistent poverty, we come in at 5.1 per cent, and rank 13th.
As the ESRI study points out, the obsession with comparisons misses what is distinctive about Irish poverty. Finding new measures won’t improve Ireland’s rating until we tackle the issues around lone parents and their exclusion from the labour market. And with unemployment rising, we might as well focus our energy on the former rather than the latter challenge.
ONE-PARENT FAMILY PAYMENT: PROPOSED CHANGES TO BENEFIT
Q: What is the One-Parent Family Payment?
A:It is a welfare payment made to a single parent who is not working. At present it is paid to the parent until the child reaches the age of 18, or 22 if the child is in full-time education. If the parent has more than one child, it is paid until the youngest child reaches 18, or 22 if still in education. The payment is €196 per week for a parent with one child. The parent is paid a further €29.80 each for each additional child.
Q: How many benefit and what is the cost?
A:As of December 2009, there were 90,500 recipients. This compares with 59,000 in 1997. The overall cost of the scheme was €1.16 billion in 2009, up from €338 million in 1997. Some 98 per cent who receive the payment are women. Some 57 per cent have one child; 28 per cent have two children; 10 per cent have three children and 5 per cent have four or more children.
Q: What changes are proposed?
A:The Government proposes to lower the age limit for qualifying children from April 2011. The first effect will come from the payment no longer being made to parents of children over 18 still in education.
Over a period of six years, the upper age for a qualifying child will drop from 18 to 13. It will drop to 17 in 2013, 16 in 2014, 15 in 2015 and 13 in 2016. That means the first single parents affected will be those with a child of 15 now. They will be 18 in 2013 and the parent will no longer qualify for the entitlement as the qualifying age will have dropped to 17. More and more parents will be affected in each succeeding year. The savings will be modest at first: €1.1 million in 2011 rising to close on €30 million a year in 2016, when the changes come into full effect.
Q: What are the reasons behind the changes?
A:The Government denies it is a cost-saving measure. The Department of Social Protection says despite substantial State spending on one-parent families the results have been poor and have failed to tackle poverty or social exclusion. "A large proportion of lone parents and their children continue to experience poverty. The child of a lone parent is four times more likely to be in consistent poverty," it said.
It also argued that parents being paid with no requirement to seek work, or engage in training or education, was not beneficial.
Q: What is the situation in other countries?
A:The department has pointed to other countries where there are work obligations when the child reaches the age of three. These include Norway, Sweden, Germany and Italy. In the UK, the payment is made until the child is 10. It will be reduced to seven in October this year.
Q: What alternatives will parents have when payment stops?
A:The department has said parents can seek jobseeker's allowance which, at €196, is the same as a single parent payment. However, parents with more than one child will lose out. Other payments including children's allowance and back to school allowances will not be affected.
To assist parents who return to work or training, Minister for Social Protection Éamon Ó Cuív has said that after-school services for over-13 secondary school pupils will be improved. He has admitted, however, that the availability of the service is "patchy" throughout the country.
– HARRY MCGEE
