RUAIRI QUINN, TD,
Sir, - Miriam Donohue (Opinion, September 20th) is missing the point that underpins the payment of child benefit to every mother with eligible children, irrespective of income.
Universal service or social support, free or subsidised at the point of use and financed out of general taxation, is central to the concept of social solidarity that is one of the pillars of the European social model.
General taxation is progressive. The more you earn the more you pay. The more you spend the more tax is collected.
Trying to differentiate the delivery of public services or public supports on the basis of income is a return to the concepts of means testing and the deserving poor. But worse, it institutionalises inequality at the centre of the social system.
The struggle for social democracy across Europe in the last century resulted in the creation of the European social model that is now the envy of the world. Maybe it is because Ireland has the poorest level of social support that Ms Donohoe can justifiably argue for a greater focus on those most in need.
The best way is to strengthen the social support system, increase public resources within it and consolidate equality with social solidarity.
But I forgot - sure did we not recently have a general election? But that was just before the announcement of all of the cutbacks. - Yours, etc.,
RUAIRI QUINN, TD, Leader of the Labour Party, Leinster House, Dublin 2.
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A chara, - Miriam Donohoe is correct in saying that many people in higher income brackets do not need a child benefit payment at the same level as people on lower or fixed incomes.
To jump from this reality to a suggestion that child benefit should be taxed is, however, neither justified nor justifiable. Child benefit, as currently constituted, has been the single greatest factor in reducing child poverty. We therefore must tread carefully before changing it.
To tax a benefit, any benefit, would be tantamount to saying that the benefit is an income. Once this is conceded, all benefits could come under the scrutiny of Mr McCreevy and his successors. We could move from a situation where child benefit (and others) are paid of right, to one where a detailed means assessment would have to be carried out on every individual and family at regular intervals. Income derived from part-time work carried out by teenagers, for example, might be accepted as part of the means test.
The money spent on means-testing all families (releasing staff, devising and administering the system and appeals procedure) might exceed that clawed back by taxing child benefit in the first place.
If people on higher incomes do not need child benefit, perhaps this is a sign that their income tax rates have been cut too much. Changing tax rates is simple, and would cost nothing in hidden administration costs beyond the normal annual changes which take place each year in the wake of the Finance Bill.
Child benefit is equitable. It is paid, regardless of other means, to the guardian of every child in the country. What is inequitable is the situation where some families must use child benefit as the family's, rather than the child's, main source of income. Changing child benefit will not create equity for those families. - Is mise,
ÁINE UÍ GHIOLLAGÁIN, Vice Chair, Women in the Home, Ráth Cairn, Co Meath.