TEENAGE pregnancy and single parenthood are very important issues for Irish society, expressing as they do the social consequences of poverty, educational failure and economic marginalisation.
In a campaign that has so far been focused on a debate about taxation which seems to be of little interest to most of the electorate, Mary Harney deserves credit for at least bringing some flavour of everyday reality to the debate. It is just a pity that she has done so with a proposal that seems ill considered, confusing, and likely to add to the myths that surround the subject.
To have a rational debate on the subject, two myths need to be scotched. Firstly, teenage pregnancies are not greatly on the increase - in 1995 there were 57 mothers aged 15 or under; in 1972 there were 52. The number of births to all teenagers has actually fallen from 2,621 in 1985 to 2,352 in 1995. The big difference now is the decline of the shotgun wedding: pregnant teenagers used to get married before the birth, now they tend not to.
And, secondly, single parents are not a vast burden on the welfare system. In total, payments to lone parents of all sorts take about 5 per cent of the social welfare budget.
The underlying assumption in the PD proposal, however, seems to be that a huge increase in young unmarried motherhood is being driven by the incentives provided by the social welfare system. There is, though, no evidence to support the belief that young unmarried women become pregnant in order to avail of benefits. What evidence there is suggests, on the contrary, that most teenage mothers know almost nothing about the welfare and housing systems before they become pregnant. The welfare system becomes a factor after, not before, pregnancy.
Single motherhood is not about the presence of incentives but about the absence of choices. Young women who leave school early and thus have poor employment prospects are by far the most likely to become unmarried mothers. If the PDs are serious about reducing it, they ought to be asking how educational and employment opportunities for young women in marginalised communities can be increased.
Where the idea of the social welfare system acting as a disincentive may have some reality is in the question not of whether young girls get pregnant but of whether they subsequently get married. The most substantial studies of single parenthood in Ireland, by Anthony McCashin of the ESRI, suggest that for very poor single mothers the somewhat more generous treatment of single parent families compared to two parent families in the social welfare system might well amount to a disincentive to marry. This, however, would not be decreased by the PD proposal. If anything, by creating new benefits for single mothers who stay at home, the gap might be increased.
And in any case, the £79.70 One Parent Family Payment, which is what single mothers get, is not means tested. It is paid whether or not the mother is living with her family or in her own flat. And if she decides to move out, she has to make a contribution to her own rent - usually of the order of £6 to £8.
In terms of disposable income, the incentive is to stay at home rather than to move out.
The PDs say they are proposing neither to increase nor decrease the amount of money the State spends on supporting single mothers and their children. According to Mairin Quill on RTE's News At One yesterday, their proposals would cost "the same amount of money as the current system. "We're talking about redirecting money.
Essentially, what the PDs seem to be proposing, therefore, is to keep the same costs but to add new services for single mothers. Those who stay in the family home would receive an unspecified "incentive" to do so. In addition, there will be "backup parenting assistance and backup assistance that a young mother in that situation requires".
But if the overall amount of money remains the same, while new costs are added, then it follows that some of the current provisions for single mothers have to be reduced. Either the One Parent Family Allowance or the community welfare rent allowances to single mothers would have to be cut. If the PDs persist with their proposal, they ought to say which of them will be reduced and by how much.
