Breda O’Brien: Lone parent cuts won’t break poverty cycle

Tánaiste Joan Burton is under pressure because of her cuts to the one-parent family payment, not least because she promised not to introduce them until we had a Scandinavian-style childcare system.

Tánaiste, Ireland having a Scandinavian-style childcare system was about as likely to happen as Yanis Varoufakis becoming president of the European Commission.

The Scandinavian childcare system, which for most people means the Swedish system, has evolved due to a cultural consensus that simply does not exist in Ireland. At its most basic, it means Swedes are willing to pay very high rates of tax in return for good services.

In Ireland, we are unwilling to do any such thing, but we still want the services.

However, it goes further. In both Sweden and Denmark, being a full-time mother is seen as a waste of an education and a failure to contribute properly to society.

While the childcare system encompasses care in centres and by registered childminders, it is considered almost regressive to want to look after your child yourself. Swedish women do have relatively high rates of part-time work but that rate is declining.

Michael Booth, in his book The Almost Nearly Perfect People, takes affectionate potshots at Scandinavian culture, pointing out that most people who think Scandinavia is some kind of Utopia have never lived there. Sweden is a very conformist society, and as such it is challenged by people who do not follow norms.

Homecare allowances are a feature of the systems in Norway, Sweden and Finland – that is, being given cash to stay at home with your child, usually up to the age of three. The uptake of this is lowest in Sweden. In a Swedish research paper cited by journalist Victoria White, one researcher fretted that homecare allowances might "give incentives to immigrant women to stay out of employment and keep their children out of daycare".

Failure to conform

In other words, it might incentivise to immigrant women not to act like Swedes, who despite being very humane in welcoming immigrants, seem put out that they do not automatically absorb Swedish values.

I fully acknowledge and admire the fact that the Swedes have far lower levels of child poverty. I just don’t think that having virtually every child in childcare is the only way to achieve this.

Nor do I admire that we Irish expend so much energy protesting water charges, but ignore reports that children are still being neglected. (Try explaining our obsession with water charges to a Scandinavian of any nationality.)

Ireland is not a good country in which to be a poor child. This is not just because of recession, but due to policy choices made by the State. A recent Hiqa report found that over 800 at-risk children in north Dublin were without an allocated social worker.

In addition, suspected physical abuse was not reported to the Garda in a timely manner, and suspected cases of long-term neglect were not being dealt with properly.

Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, immediately declared that it would mend its ways, and the issue disappears from public consciousness, until the next report.

Nipped in the bud

Neglect is a serious issue, visible in the bodies and minds of children. A child who is neglected will most likely be both physically smaller and emotionally hardened. There are windows in a child’s development for acquisition of language and social skills, and these close when a child does not experience adequate care.

The Tánaiste’s cuts to lone parents which came into effect on July 2nd, are, I believe, well-intentioned, and an attempt to break the cycle of welfare dependency that embeds people in poverty.

However, the majority of lone parents are women, and while Sweden, the much-touted ideal, has high levels of female employment, it is because so many work in the family-friendly public sector.

Again, Irish State policy rules that out. So where are the extra hours of work to lift lone parents out of poverty going to come from?

Veronica Scanlon of the Department of Social Protection said of the 10,000 parents who will lose out, "the majority will stand to gain financially if they can increase the number of hours they work each week to 19 – which for most should be possible, given their children will be at school".

School is out for summer, and for many other weeks of the year. What job only demands work in the morning and early afternoon, and not during school holidays? Not even teaching offers that, as most teachers work for hours after school finishes.

In fairness to the Tánaiste, she has enhanced the provision of community-based childcare, but it is nowhere near enough. The Government tells us it cherishes diversity, especially in families. But this move is like saying, “Big hug. Now, let’s cut your benefits.”

We don’t have to be Sweden, but we could be a humane Ireland. Reverse the cuts.