Costs of abortion would be better spent on helping the poor
■ On May 25, Referendum Day, a report from the national association of charities, The Wheel, stated: “Currently, social welfare supports are not adequate to prevent people from falling below the poverty line or to provide them with an income to afford a minimum essential standard of living based on the current cost of goods and services necessary to live in dignity.”
This is certainly true with regard to the weekly One Parent Family Payment. A weekly income of €227.97 is needed to keep a person from falling below the poverty threshold in Ireland.
The One Parent Family Payment was €217.80 when Fine Gael came to power in 2011. It dropped to €188 per week in 2016, only rising this year – when we were assured the economic recovery was well underway – to €198 per week, still well below the poverty line.
One of the powerful arguments used by Government ministers campaigning for Yes in the referendum was that pregnant women unable to afford a child and too poor to travel are entitled to abortion facilities in Ireland.
They argued this knowing full well that welfare cuts since they took office in 2011, especially cuts in the One Parent Family payment, were keeping such women in consistent poverty.
The Wheel research shows more than 403,000 people (8.7pc of the population) were living in consistent poverty in 2015.
The Government’s solution – provide abortion facilities – will not lift one woman out of poverty.
As a No voter I would dearly prefer my taxes to go to lifting every family out of poverty than for abortion facilities which will do nothing to alleviate the misery of living below the poverty line.
Ann Kehoe