I’ve been listening to the Dail speeches in reply to Brian Lenihan’s speech. As someone who will have a small baby to feed, clothe and put nappys on next May, I feel that I am entitled to weigh in on the debate over child benefit.
The problem with child benefit isn’t that it has been reduced, the problem with child benefit is that it is a universal payment.
In my circumstances, unless both SK and I lose our jobs (and I think that is reasonably unlikely for both of us to lose our jobs at the moment) we are not going to be affected in an adverse way over 16 euro a month less in MONEY FOR FREE or should I call it by it’s proper name, child benefit.
The way I look at child benefit is this. We are choosing to bring a baby into this country. We choose to do that in full knowledge that our home purchased near to the top of the boom is in negative equity should we need to sell it tomorrow. We don’t need to sell it, so it’s not actually an issue. We choose parenthood knowing what childcare costs every month. We choose parenthood knowing how much GP visits cost, how much babysitting costs, how much milk for the babby costs (nothing if you breast feed for six months, but that’s another story). We choose parenthood knowing what all the studies on the cost of raising children say it costs. We choose parenthood knowing what private schools cost, what school books cost, what school uniforms cost, what university costs, what gap years in South America costs, what extra-cirricular demands like ponies and dinghies cost. We still choose it. So it is our responsibility. It is nice that the government chooses to help us out and gives us (let me write it again) MONEY FOR FREE. If the government wants to increase that money or decrease that money, that is their decision. Bottom line, when you are getting money for free, you should be thankful for what you get and stop whining about the decrease.
To say that the decrease in child benefit and the abolishment of the early childcare supplement will declare us (as a family, lumped in with all families by those declaring this small decrease a disaster) destitute with no milk for the babby and no way to clothe the babby is complete nonsense.
So what is a solution. Well, you could tax child benefit. But to tax child benefit would actually mean that everyone in receipt of it would need to be in the tax system. You could means test child benefit, but to do that would require honesty about bank (overseas or domestic) accounts and credit union accounts and actual income on the part of applicants. Or, you can apply a reduction across the board. A reduction across the board seems quite fair to me given the deflation in the economy and the decrease in the basic costs of living. People say their costs of living have not decreased. That is complete nonsense. How can they not have when the ESRI and CSO are saying that they have and they have the statistics to back up these claims. I also have statistics to back up these claims. The statistics are our gas bill, our electricity bill, our mortgage and our grocery bill.

When I hear Joan Burton in the Dail saying that the decrease in child benefit is going to affect the people with the sliced pans and sausages in the shopping trollies rather than fresh meat and veg, I scratch my head. I go online to superquinn and discover the price of sausages and some kinds of fresh meat per kilo. Sausages, per kilo, of various brands, Denny, Superquinn own brand and others are MORE EXPENSIVE than certain types of fresh meat. Sliced pans per kilo are MORE EXPENSIVE that kilos of potatoes. If child benefit is going to be summarised by Joan Burton as making life harder for the sausages and sliced bread brigade, then I say this. Let them have cooking lessons. Let them learn how to feed their children with fish, meat and potatoes, which are cheaper than sausages and sliced pans, and more nutritious to boot. What is a white sliced pan if it isn’t empty calories with no nutritional content.

Please note, I absolutely sympathise with public sector workers who have had a pay cut, they will find a large gap in their pockets and I do actually sympathise with those cuts, despite thinking that they were necessary. But if you are complaining solely about child benefit cuts whilst still employed, don’t be so dramatic and don’t think it is going to ruin your life. There are so many ways to earn sixteen euro a month. Show some initiative instead of expecting the government to bail you out at every turn.