‘Deadbeat’ fathers will be taken to task

Apr 07, 2009 News

…as Manickchand launches Single Parent Assistance programme

Human Services and Social Security Minister, Priya Manickchand, during the launch of the Single Parent Assistance programme at Anna Regina, Essequibo, yesterday, said that the issue of fathers not owning up to their responsibility to their children will have to be aggressively addressed.
According to the Minister, before the end of the year, the Ministry in collaboration with the Home Affairs and Legal Affairs Ministries “will have to find ways of addressing the deadbeat fathers.”
Manickchand said that a man cannot want to contribute in making the children but is unwilling to contribute to their upbringing, “deadbeat fathers must be denounced… deadbeat fathers must be a thing of the past…it is hard for a mother alone.”
The first component of the Single Parent Assistance Programme that was launched was assistance as it relates to single parents with two or more children that earn $30,000 or less and has daycare as expenditure.
“We launch with the daycare vouchers so that you can still keep your children in day care and continue to work.”
Manickchand told the small gathering that in the 2006 elections campaign her party proposed assistance for single parents given that in most instances their income was the sole source of finances to take care of their children and it was surely a difficult task.
Manickchand said that in 2008 she had called for people to get registered and when that information was on hand the database had to be prepared. She explained that the process of preparing the database took some six months given the verification and cross checking that had to be done.
She added that the emphasis in the need for a database was the fact that she did not want the naysayers to say that the recipients that would benefit from the programme were in anyway hand picked.
As it relates to the critiques on the sum of money attached to the day care assistance the Minister pointed out that prior to the programme it was a fee that had to and was paid each month, “we are now just assisting…That extra money can now be used to buy something such as milk…Every little bit helps.”
According to Manickchand, the government would love to dole out more in assistance, “but while we are helping single parents we also have to help the pensioner, persons on public assistance, the running of hospitals that provide free service the many schools and the numerous other social services that have to be maintained.
“There are so many things being done but at this stage this is all that the economy can afford”
In excess of 700 persons have been identified to receive the daycare assistance. They were selected from a database of some 30,000 single parents who will also benefit in some way or another.

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‘Deadbeat’ fathers will be taken to task

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