From July 2015, lone parents with children aged seven and older will no longer be entitled to the one-parent family payment. This has become known as the Burton cut but, more than that, it is a brutal cut that will plunge thousands more children into consistent poverty, on top of all the other cuts that have affected lone parent families. Up to 30,000 lone parent families will be affected by this particular move. Thousands of those will have severe income reductions as a result, with some losing up to €140 a week. Others, for example, a lone parent working 20 hours a week on a minimum wage, will face a cut of €108 a week.

I do not understand how the Government can even contemplate introducing such a measure at the end of this month. The Taoiseach would know, and Fintan O'Toole put it very well in his article this morning in The Irish Times, that "A lone parent can't ditch a child and go off to work without access to education, childcare and a stable job with a living wage". This cut comes on top of a series of welfare cuts that have affected families, low-income families in particular, and lone parent families. The back to school allowance was cut by one third. The income disregard for lone parent families was cut by €147 a week to €90 a week. Community employment schemes, which were availed of significantly by lone parent families, have been gutted. There have been taxation changes that have impacted particularly hard on separated and lone parent families. The issue of access to education has not improved, and we have no Scandinavian child care model. The result of all of that is that consistent child poverty increased from approximately 6.8% in 2008 to almost double that percentage, 12%, in 2013.

The policy is not working. It is not getting lone parents back to work. It is having the opposite impact and it is driving people further out of work and into poverty. Some 60% of lone parents who were getting the one-parent family payment were working part-time outside the home in 2012. In 2014, that had gone down to 36%. My simple question to the Taoiseach is will the Government will reverse this policy and stop its implementation at the commencement of July?

It is not intended to reverse it, and I will explain to Deputy Martin why. The Government has a particular programme to make work pay. We cannot allow a situation, in an economy that is recovering like ours, which bypasses thousands of households that are locked into joblessness. That has been one of the real difficulties for so many families. Jobless households with children are at particular risk of perpetuating a cycle of poverty that goes on from generation to generation.

That is absolute rubbish. They are working mothers.

The purpose of the phased scheme is to reduce long-term social welfare dependency, an aim with which I am sure Deputy Martin agrees.

From when this scheme was introduced back in 1997 until the end of 2010, recipient numbers increased by 50% and annual expenditure increased by €772 million every year. Despite the significant levels of investment - in excess of €1 billion per annum from 2009 to 2012 - it has not been successful in preventing lone parents from being significantly more at risk of consistent poverty compared to the population as a whole. In 2004, lone parents were at more than 4.5 times greater risk of consistent poverty when compared with the remainder of the population. That is not something we can stand over.

The Government will make them poorer.

It is outrageous.

Prior to the reforms, lone parents could have been on the scheme until their youngest child turned 18 years of age, or 22 if the child was in full-time education. The non-conditional nature of the payment, coupled with its very long duration, consigned many lone parents and their children to long-term dependency on welfare, which is not a good position to be in.

Right.

Ireland's supports for lone parents have been out of line with international norms, under which there has been a movement away from long-term and non-conditional support towards a much more supportive approach. In New Zealand and the Netherlands, for instance, the equivalent lone parent supports cease when the youngest child reaches the age of five years.

They probably have child care, though.

They have child care.

The evidence clearly indicates that, despite the investment, the scheme was not successful in addressing the risk of poverty and may have been contributing to the welfare dependency trap for many of those people. It is anticipated that approximately 30,200 recipients will transition out of this payment on 2 July 2015.

Then they will be a lot poorer.

Of these, 20,000 parents will experience no change in income or will gain after the transition. The gain for individuals will be in the range of €10 to €150 per week, depending on their level of earnings and the number of children they have. The remaining 10,000 who are in employment will, based on their current circumstances, have an incentive to increase the number of hours they work.

That is the lingo.

They should demand that their employers give them more hours.

Who is going to mind the kids?

Of these 10,000, approximately 6,000 lone parents will have an immediate incentive to increase the number of hours they work to 19 in order to claim family income supplement and the back-to-work family dividend.

It is just about choice, is it?

These individuals will be better off financially than they are in their current position. Many parents in this position will be able to increase their hours to 19 per week or four per day, given that their youngest children will still be at school.

This is better than a script of Oliver Callan's.

The positive impact has been evident from the increase in the number of new family income supplement applications from lone parents who were affected by these reforms in July 2013 and July 2014. The incentive is there to reach a point at which they can draw down the family income supplement and be better off than they are in their current position.

They are not automatically entitled to the family income supplement.

They should be thrilled.

Approximately 20,000 will either have no change or be better off, and the remaining 10,000 will have an incentive to increase their income and increase the number of hours they work in order to be eligible for family income supplement or the back-to-work dividend, and therefore be better off.

That is not correct.

Wealthy men in suits are ordering working mothers.

Would Deputy Coppinger ever stay quiet, please? It is Deputy Micheál Martin's question.

The Taoiseach should put aside those written notes that someone gives to him to read out in answer to Leaders' Questions. He should go out and meet the people who are affected. The Taoiseach is out of touch and completely detached from the reality on the ground. The policy is not working. In 2012, 60% of lone parents on the one-parent family payment were actually at work outside the home. In 2014, the figure is 36%. It is counterintuitive, as those who are actually at work are losing the most out of this. They are being absolutely hammered as a result of this measure.

I put it to the Taoiseach that, not so long ago, the Tánaiste, Deputy Burton, said:

I will only proceed with the measures to reduce the upper age limit to seven years in the event that I get a credible and bankable commitment on the delivery of such a system of child care enjoyed by the Scandinavians by the time of this year's budget. If this is not forthcoming, the measure will not proceed.

Recently in the Dáil, when Deputy Willie O'Dea asked the Tánaiste about this commitment she made, she replied, "[T]he delivery and expansion of child care services is the responsibility of the Department of Children and Youth Affairs." I know I cannot use the word "lie", but I will use the phrase "broken promise". Was that not a basic untruth? Would the Taoiseach accept that the Tánaiste has reneged on a cast-iron commitment that she gave to the Dáil, the public and the various lone parent family organisations that she would not introduce the measure she is introducing in a couple of weeks unless there was a Scandinavian-type child care model? We know we do not have that. Is that not a broken promise? Does the Taoiseach accept that the Tánaiste has reneged on her commitment and that the policy is clearly not working?

Wonder Woman.

I cannot believe that the leader of the Fianna Fáil party, who has had long experience in politics, is content to leave many lone parents wallowing in a poverty trap.

They are working.

They have an incentive to get out of the trap and be better off under the new transition arrangements.

How dare the Taoiseach say that?

Why are we not out on the street celebrating?

It is normal basic manners for Deputy Coppinger to allow the person who was asked the question to reply. It is not Deputy Coppinger's question, and I ask her to please stay quiet.

The position is that 30,200 people will be affected by the transition. Deputy Martin says the policy is not working, and it is not, because people are locked into a poverty trap. The opportunity for them is to get out of that poverty trap, increase their benefit and incomes and have a better life.

The Government is preventing them from doing that.

As I said, 20,000 will experience no change or will be better off. The remaining 10,000 have the opportunity to work more hours and be eligible to draw either the family income supplement or the back-to-work dividend. That is a fact. An example of the kind of gain that can be had here is a lone parent with one child who increases her work from 15 to 20 hours per week at the national minimum wage, which the Government is now examining in terms of a report.

Where is she going to get the extra five hours?

If she claims family income supplement for the first time, she will be €38 better off. Is Deputy Martin seriously saying to that lone parent that she can be better off but he will not allow her to do that?

Her child is running around the streets and she is looking for the five hours.

Work is not demand-led. Nobody knocks on their employer's door and says, "I am going to work for an extra four hours next week."

She may also be entitled to claim the back-to-work family dividend for each additional child she has, increasing her income by a further €30 per week per child, so that is almost €68 a week in total where the lone parent has one child.

We are in low-hours contract zones. Whatever bean counter put that together, the Taoiseach should sit him down again.

What about child care?

That is an absolute example of how a lone parent with one child can be €68 better off than the current position. If Deputy Martin does not believe that, he should go and talk to them, because I do.

I have talked to people. That is the point. The Taoiseach should go to the family resource centres, community centres and community employment schemes. They will tell him. Lone parents are being targeted deliberately.

That is why we need an incentive for people who are locked into a welfare trap, generation after generation, to get out of that and have the opportunity to earn more, provide more for their families and so be better off. These are facts.

They are harrowing facts for the people affected.

I thank Deputy Dooley.

The Taoiseach is welcome.

I appreciate that.