Parents in this country are under pressure. The cost of accommodation is out of control and out of the reach of too many. Child care bills are rising. There is no sign of any incremental progress on the extension of general practitioner, GP, care for children on which we were making progress. The modern workplace puts enormous pressure on parents. They fight to sustain their careers and raise their families but the recent budget did little for those parents. There was no increase in child benefit. Crèches raised their prices. There was no subsidy increase on child care and nothing to address the ever-rising price of a home. They got tax cuts that cost them money because they have to pay more for the basic services the State should be providing from health care to child care to education.

Last week, the ESRI made it official. It did not get much notice, but its study on the distributional impact of tax and welfare in the last budget confirmed that it would not even give the price of a cup of coffee. Instead, it would cost people. It shows all income groups will suffer losses, with the lowest income groups being hardest hit and the best off losing least. Families with a single earner lose most. In an economy where the cost of everything is increasing and where wages are not rising fast enough, people will be worse off. In a recovering economy, that is some achievement.

There are actions that could be taken that would give parents a break. Parents in Ireland have the right to 18 weeks of unpaid parental leave. For many, that leave is absolutely necessary to care for a sick child or other issues, but it is at a huge cost. A Programme for a Partnership Government states that the Government will increase paid parental leave in the first year of birth. In the manifesto for leadership that the Taoiseach produced, he said he would improve and extend contributory benefits such as parental leave. He said something similar in his address to the Fine Gael national conference recently, yet The Sunday Times reported last weekend, in a report written by Valerie Flynn, that the Government wants to delay the implementation of the new European Union law that would give Irish workers the right to four months of paid parental leave. An Irish official was reported to have said that the Irish Government has reservations about these matters.

My question is a simple one. Why, on the one hand, is the Government saying it wants to give paid parental leave when, on the other, behind closed doors in Brussels, it is saying the opposite? Will the Government introduce four months of paid parental leave as is being discussed in the EU directive, and when will it do so?

I am not involved personally in the negotiations in Brussels but it is Government policy that we want to introduce paid parental leave allowing parents to share the leave among themselves. Currently, maternity benefit and paternity benefit are separate. We would like to have a parental leave with parental benefit attached to it, which would allow parents to share it, and we will be guided by the European law in that regard. If the Deputy wants evidence of that, this Government of Fine Gael, the Independent Alliance and Independents have increased maternity benefit and paternity benefit twice. We have extended maternity benefit to cover children who were born prematurely to give their mothers more time with them. We have also introduced paid paternity leave and gave an increase. It is our plan to move towards a new system of parental leave with parental benefit attached to it, which parents can share, although realistically we are talking about legislation next year and its introduction the year after that.

The Deputy will know that the ESRI does its analysis in a particular way. He was a major critic of it when he was around the Cabinet table and he will know that when the ESRI does its analysis, it does not take into account the benefit of any service improvements so if we improve the health service, education or bring in subsidised child care, that does not count for anything using the ESRI simulating welfare and income tax changes, SWITCH, analysis. It also uses a particular system where it adjusts for average increases in wage earnings.

What people will do throughout January is look at their payslips and throughout January, February and March they will look at the amount of money coming into their pockets. The people who are working will see a reduction in their universal social charge. People on middle incomes will see that the standard rate cut-off point will go up and they will pay less of their income at the higher rate. People who need medicines will find that their prescription charges go down in January not just for people with medical cards, but also those who do not have medical cards. People with children will find that they are getting a full second year of free preschool. People who are on low pay, such as those on the minimum wage, will see the minimum wage go up in January. Public servants will see pay restoration and pay increases happening in two tranches next year, in January and October. People whose children are in receipt of child care, particularly those with children between six months and three years, will see the subsidies for child care continuing throughout the year, with targeted benefits for those on low incomes. As mentioned earlier, people in receipt of carer's allowance will see a right to a GP visit card being extended to them. Low income families, those in receipt of family income supplement, will gain as much as €10 extra a week from March when those changes come into effect and lone parents who are working will have significant gains as well. The Deputy can try to denigrate the Government achievements all he likes. What we are starting to see now, which is something I am committed to making happen as Taoiseach and as Head of this Government, is all individuals and all families in all parts of the country seeing their living standards improve as the economy improves.

We are now entering a Trump world of alternative facts. The truth is that most people will see some improvement to the value of about a cup of coffee. The real cost of providing child care and being able to afford a home is receding from them, but that reality is lost on the Taoiseach. On the net question I asked, the Taoiseach stated that he is in favour of paid parental leave but we will have a law next year and perhaps parental leave being paid the year after that. Is it the Taoiseach's commitment in his programme for Government or his leadership manifesto that it may happen in two years' time? Why is it reported that he is resisting the EU legislation or is the report, authoritatively put in one of the national newspapers, false? Is that what the Taoiseach is saying?

To be very clear about this, we already have paid parental leave but we do it in a particular way. We have maternity leave and maternity benefit for the mother and paternity leave and paternity benefit for the father. As a Government, we have increased the cash payment in the last budget and will increase it again in March. We also brought in new rules, particularly around premature babies. That is the current system.

What the Government wants to do and wants to see happen at a European level is a move to a new system of parental leave which would effectively replace maternity and paternity leave and allow couples the autonomy to choose how to share that leave. At present, a European regulation to bring that into effect is under discussion. I am not party to the detailed negotiations on that but I can absolutely assure Deputy Howlin that the Government intends to support the regulation, introduce parental leave and parental benefit in Ireland and change the current system to the one I have outlined. There should still be dedicated maternity leave for mothers because they are the ones who give birth and they need particular time to recover. There should be a dedicated carve-out for mothers, and then perhaps the rest can be shared between the two parents.

Before we introduce legislation, we want to find out what the European legislation is going to be. It would make no sense at all for this Government to enact legislation in respect of parental leave here in Ireland in the next few months only to discover six months later that there is a European directive or regulation to which it runs contrary.