Sir, - In response to the article by Kathryn Holmquist on lone parents and their children, I question journalists' use of the behaviour of people on the street on a particular day to explain the neglect attributed by Ms Shortall, later in the article, to one-parent families.
In this article, both journalist and TD participate in the continual blaming of poor one-parent families for their plight, in order to appeal to populist begrudgery. Is Ms Shortall attempting to appeal to the Alice Glenn brigade in her constituency by promoting discrimination against families that do not fit the "family unit" criteria she espouses? If the journalist and TD are genuinely concerned about one-parent families, they should be unambiguously promoting equal treatment and valuing of all families.
The assertions in the article that the traditional family is being discriminated against in social welfare policy is baseless in fact. The Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice recently identified the fact that "under the social welfare code, the state treats married and cohabiting couples the same and under the tax code it treats the married couples more favourably." (Jesuit centre for Faith and Justice, September 1996).
Finally, if the journalist and TD wish to moralise on lone-parent families, they should bear in mind that to explain the increase in lone parenthood, one has to look at other factors, such as the declining taboo on premarital sex, changing social attitudes, and the earlier onset of puberty", and not depend on anecdotes and mere observations of children running down Henry Street (Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice, September 1996). - Yours, etc.,
Democratic Left, Dublin North West, 5 Main Street, Finglas, Co. Dublin.