Single parents fear losing their homes
That leaves lone parents as one of the groups most at risk, because they are the poorest in the State, according to SPARK.
This organisation started with a diverse group of single parents communicating through social networking channels, in response to proposed budget cuts.
The enormous response to their postings led them to form SPARK.
SPARK organiser Leah Speight, a single parent herself, says: “65% of the poorest children in Ireland live in one-parent households. The budget cuts for 2012 discriminated against single parents, with multiple cuts across the board.
“We are here to raise awareness of the many challenges one-parent families currently face, and to identify the essential supports needed to allow us equal participation in society. SPARK members seek equality for our children, regardless of their family circumstances.”
As a single parent myself, whose daughter is happily all grown up, settled and with an admirable career, the concerns of SPARK’S members struck a chord with me.
Single parents worry about bills, childcare, their children’s future educational prospects, their choice of friends, and their emotional stability — everything in fact that every parent anguishes over at one time or another.
The big difference is, of course, that they do this essentially on their own.
No matter how supportive friends and family are, there is still the overriding feeling that you are constantly looking for favours and are in danger of gradually becoming a nuisance to your nearest and dearest. And yet, single parents are struggling to hold a family together.
Often there is an inference that the single parent and their offspring do not, somehow, constitute a “real” family. I wondered just how the swingeing budgetary cuts are affecting rural single parents who, even before the budget, were faced with fewer services and greater isolation from support networks than city-dwellers.
I spoke to three women — all single parents and active SPARK members — about their lives and the daily challenges they face. They are Leah, who lives in Dublin; Brid, in the Aran Islands; and Michele, also in Co Galway, from Oranmore.
“It was last November when we first began getting word that the budget was going to be especially hard on us,” says Leah. “A few of us started sharing our concerns through social networks, and that’s how SPARK came into being. The name came about because we hope we will light a spark on this whole issue.”
Lean has a 12-year-old son, lives in Clondalkin and works in research and development on a job-share basis. “It took me by surprise just how isolated so many rural single parents were, without support networks of any kind. We were hearing from single parents all over Ireland, mostly women but a few men as well. Now we have over 1,000 members, and there’s no question that those living in isolated rural areas are under increased pressure since the budget cuts.
“It’s extraordinary. With one flick of the pen, a minister can bring chaos to the lives of so many, and without any prior consultation.”
Leah points out that what children — rural and urban — need most is stability, and that single parents are particularly vulnerable to cuts in the rent allowance, which vary widely around the country. This can mean moving home, and worse still for a child, changing schools.
“Rural-dwellers don’t have the same amount of choice when it comes to finding a home,” she points out. “And if their landlord refuses to lower the rent to the required amount, it can be particularly difficult for them to find a place to live.
“I have been horrified to discover just how many single parents in isolated rural areas are really afraid of becoming homeless.
“Only recently, we’ve heard from someone in rural Cavan who had to move because of the cuts, and she was at her wits’ end. She had no money, her house was cold and she was going without meals herself because she had a special needs kid who no longer qualified for assistance. Those of us who read her post were in floods of tears.”
* wwwsparkcampaign.com
