The Taoiseach has insisted that the cost of giving the new childcare payments to migrant workers may be as little as €1 million in a year, a small fraction of the €50 million claimed by Fine Gael.
While Fine Gael said last night that it stood by its estimate, Mr Ahern dismissed it. Fine Gael had said child benefit plus the new childcare payment for non-resident children of migrant workers could cost €150 million, of which €50 million would be for the childcare payment.
Senior Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs officials gave estimates close to those of Mr Ahern.
Asked to dissociate himself from remarks by Minister of State Brian Lenihan that Fine Gael had indulged in "an ugly outbreak of Fine Gael racism" over the issue, Mr Ahern said he did not believe the Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny or his party to be "racist". However he did not believe the payment of this money to migrant workers should have been turned into such a big issue.
In a robust Dáil performance the Taoiseach said to deny such payments to non-resident children of migrant workers from the new EU member states would be to adopt "a Scrooge mentality".
He and the senior officials said the new childcare payment of €1,000 per annum was to be paid only to those already receiving child benefit, and in respect of children under six. They said child benefit claims were currently being made in respect of some 4,000 children under the age of 18 by EU nationals with children resident in other member states.
"Assuming that one-quarter of those children are under the age of six, the additional annual costs for such children will be approximately €1 million," said the Taoiseach.
The department officials said later they estimated that of the budget of €353 million in a full year for the new childcare payment, just half of 1 per cent would be made to children of other EU nationals living in their original member state. Claims were coming in at the rate of 80 per week, but even if the number doubled the payments would amount to just a tiny fraction of the total budget.
They rejected reports that the Government was surprised at having to make the payment in respect of non-national children on the back of advice from the Attorney General. They had always factored in the payments.
A Fine Gael spokesman said their estimates were based on assessments from within the Polish community here, including the editor of a Polish language newspaper, that some 25 per cent of Poles here had children at home.
"We stand over the argument that there is a cost on it that the Government has not allowed for in their budget."
The payment would be made to migrant parents under a 33-year-old EU regulation from which Irish people had benefited hugely. Under this regulation, nationals of one EU country receive the benefits available from the EU state in which they work.
The Irish health service alone had benefited to the extent of €420 million last year as a result of similar benefits paid by the UK taxpayer for people now in Ireland, many of whom were returned emigrants who had built up entitlements in the UK.