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Naomi Connolly from One Family’s Advocacy Project tells Social Inclusion Forum about her experience as a lone parent and changes she wants government to make

For immediate release
 Thursday 8th May 2025
 

Naomi Connolly, a parent representative in One Family’s Advocacy Project, today told the Social Inclusion Forum of the myriad barriers lone parents face when returning to education to try and build a better life for themselves and their children. Naomi has three children and has been parenting alone for 10 years. She returned to education five years ago and has just completed her thesis in Social Care.

In a powerful speech to attendees, Naomi outlined her experience as a lone parent, the difficulties facing her returning to education to improve her employability and lift her family out of poverty and the need for government to provide targeted and adequate supports for lone parents returning to education.  One Family welcomed the invitation from the Department of Social Protection for Naomi to speak at the Social Inclusion Forum and called on government to urgently address this issue as well as the chronic deprivation facing the majority of one-parent families in Ireland, with the following actions:
 

 

Naomi Connolly, Parent Representative, One Family Advocacy Project said:  

“When my marriage ended, our lives turned upside down. It was so hard trying to figure everything out and make sure my children have the life they deserve. I took a risk going back to education. I wasn’t sure how we would manage and really, a lot how we did manage was down to luck, help and support from my college and from different charities along the way. I am almost out the other side and now I can see a better future for us all, but it shouldn’t have been this difficult. It should never be a risk to return to education but for lone parents, it is.” 

Carly Bailey, Policy Manager at One Family said:  


“The odds are stacked against one-parent families and without government intervention, this will not change. Returning to education as a lone parent is daunting and demanding, but systemic barriers mean completing that education often feels impossible. It’s critical that government provides targeted, ongoing supports for one-parent families returning to education to ensure lone parents can complete their courses and succeed, including; improved financial support, flexible learning options and delivering a public system of early childhood education and care to remove the critical barriers faced by lone parents returning to education. Targeted measures not only empower parents, but they can also break the cycle of generational poverty as children experience better outcomes in terms of health, education, income and overall well-being.

There are almost 220,000 families headed by a lone parent in Ireland and CSO statistics2 tells us that almost half of all one-parent families are living in enforced deprivation. Returning to education can be a vital step for a lone parent to lift their family out of poverty, but too many lone parents are prevented from doing that because of the lack of supports available to them on that journey; we are calling on government to change that and put in place the supports needed to give lone parents the best chance at success.” 

Karen Kiernan, CEO of One Family 

“Through our new Advocacy Project, we were able to link Naomi with this opportunity to speak at the Social Inclusion Forum, to have her experience as a lone parent to be heard by the Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary, senior Department officials as well as other civil society organisations.

It is critical that the lived experiences of one-parent families are listened to, recognised and valued in the spaces where policy and legislative changes can occur. While Naomi’s experiences are unique, there is a universal theme at play due to structural barriers faced by so many who parent alone: enforced deprivation for one-parent families, the struggle to survive day-to-day and the nearly impossible journey for a lone parent to navigate a return to education, along with their caring responsibilities and economic provision for their children.
These barriers are not unbreakable; they were designed by our systems and can be dismantled by our systems.  We are calling on government, and specifically Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary, to use equitable, evidence-based policy making to improve the lives of one-parent families by ensuring every parent and child has a decent standard of living and can afford to have their basic needs met.”
 

[ENDS] 

Available for interview: Naomi Connolly, Parent Representative of One Family’s Advocacy Project; Carly Bailey, Project Manager, One Family; Karen Kiernan, CEO, One Family

For more information, please contact Vicky Masterson, One Family Communications Manager on 083 447 0645 / vmasterson@onefamily.ie
 

Notes to Editor: 

  1. One Family’s Advocacy Project aims to embed the experience and voice of one-parent families in the areas where policy and legislation changes occur. The project gives lone parents an opportunity to share their experience and perspective on the social and economic challenges facing one-parent families and advocate for the changes needed to improve their lives. Panel members are given the opportunity to work with One Family to develop our policy and advocacy work and also with decision makers in the Dáil, our local councils, government departments and in Europe, as opportunities arise. This 2-year project is funded by UBIDAC via The Community Foundation of Ireland. 

 

  1. One Family Ireland was founded in 1972 as Cherish and is Ireland’s national organisation for one-parent families and people sharing parenting or separating, offering support, information and services to all members of all one-parent families, to those sharing parenting, to those experiencing an unplanned pregnancy and to professionals working with one-parent families. Children are at the centre of One Family’s work and the organisation helps all the adults in their lives, including mums, dads, grandparents, step-parents, new partners and other siblings, offering a holistic model of specialist family support services. These services include the askonefamily national helpline on 0818 66 22 12, counselling, and provision of training courses for parents and for professionals. For further information, visit www.onefamily.ie. The askonefamily helpline can be contacted on 0818 66 22 12 or 01 662 9212 or helpline@onefamily.ie. 

 

  1. The Social Inclusion Forum is an annual national event hosted by the Department of Social Protection. It provides people affected by poverty and social exclusion, as well as the community organisations representing them, the opportunity to come together with officials from relevant Government Departments and the Minister for Social Protection to discuss poverty and social inclusion policy and related issues of common concern. It also allows for discussion about the implementation of the Roadmap for Social Inclusion, the national strategy for poverty reduction and improved social inclusion. The event is organised by the Social inclusion Division, with the European Anti-Poverty Network (EAPN) Ireland and Community Work Ireland (CWI) as event partners. 

 

One Family  joins 16 international organisations to launch new #SingleParentCommunity campaign

Friday 21st March 2025
For immediate release

To mark international Single Parents Day, One Family has partnered with Trinity College Dublin and Glasgow Caledonian University to launch a new campaign highlighting the history, lived experiences and misconceptions facing one-parent families, and to call on governments globally to develop better policies to support one-parent families.

The #SingleParentCommunity campaign includes an international group of historians, policymakers and NGOs, led by Glasgow Caledonian University and Trinity College Dublin, and funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council. To launch the campaign, a powerful new short animation Time for a New Chapter, produced by Media Co-op, has been released, reflecting the history and the lived experiences of single parents, the pride and strength in single parenthood, and the misconceptions that many lone parents face.

This new campaign is calling on government in Ireland, and internationally, to develop adequate policies to support one-parent families including:

Members of the public are also encouraged to share their ideas of how governments can better support one-parent families at https://www.vopfn.org/timeforachange.

The project was co-produced with network members including Dr Janet Greenlees, Reader in Health History at Glasgow Caledonian University, Professor Lindsey Earner-Byrne of Trinity College Dublin, Karen Kiernan, CEO One Family and Terese Edwards of the National Council for Single Mothers and their Children, Australia.


TCD Prof of Contemporary Irish History, Lindsey Earner-Byrne said:

“Bringing historical research together with contemporary policy and NGO expertise was extremely powerful in enabling us to see the roots of the contemporary challenges faced by single parent families. We could track the punitive response of the workhouses of the 1830s through to the stigmatisation of lone parents in need of state support now. It became very clear to us that if Ireland centred the single parent in its policies, then all other families would benefit. In essence, this collaborative animation came out of our collective insights about the resilience of single parent families and the degree to which the historic shadow of stigma, blame and marginalisation persists. We want to stress that it is time for a new chapter!”


Karen Kiernan, CEO One Family said :

“We are delighted to have collaborated on the development of this important animation highlighting the joy and challenges of parenting alone. We plan to use this video to inform policymakers working to change hearts, minds and policies so that one-parent families can be supported to move out of poverty and into lives of dignity.

One in four families with children in Ireland are one-parent families, including over 356,000 children. One-parent families across Ireland continue to face severe financial hardship, as demonstrated by recent CSO figures, and deprivation is increasing for many families who are struggling to survive. On International Single Parents Day, we are calling on our government, and specifically Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary, to use evidence-based decision making and targeted payments for the poorest children who live in one-parent families.”

[ENDS]


Available for interview: Lindsey Earner-Byrne, Professor of Contemporary History, Trinity College Dublin / Karen Kiernan, CEO One Family

For more information, please contact Vicky Masterson, One Family Communications Manager on 083 447 0645 / vmasterson@onefamily.ie

Notes to Editor:

  1. The Vulnerability & One Parent Family Network (VOPFN) is a shared forum for historians, archivists and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) working on one-parent families in the OECD countries of England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. Through participatory research it draws upon the collective insights and expertise of this group to explore the similarities and differences between these NGOs and the role of history in contemporary and future one-parent family policy and experience. The network was established through a grant from the Arts and Humanities Research
  2. One Family Ireland was founded in 1972 as Cherish and is Ireland’s national organisation for one-parent families and people sharing parenting or separating, offering support, information and services to all members of all one-parent families, to those sharing parenting, to those experiencing an unplanned pregnancy and to professionals working with one-parent families. Children are at the centre of One Family’s work and the organisation helps all the adults in their lives, including mums, dads, grandparents, step-parents, new partners and other siblings, offering a holistic model of specialist family support services. These services include the askonefamily national helpline on 0818 66 22 12, counselling, and provision of training courses for parents and for professionals. For further information, visit onefamily.ie. The askonefamily helpline can be contacted on 0818 66 22 12or 01 662 9212 or helpline@onefamily.ie.”
  1. Lindsey Earner-Byrne is the Professor of Contemporary Irish History and the Director of the Centre for Modern and Contemporary Irish History at Trinity College Dublin. She has researched and published widely on modern Irish history with a particular focus on poverty, welfare, gender, sexuality, health and vulnerable and marginalised groups. Most recently she has co-authored a history of Ireland’s abortion journey with Professor Diane Urquhart of Queen’s University Belfast, The Irish Abortion Journey, 1920-2018 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019). She narrated and co-authored documentary Forgotten: The Widows of the Irish Revolution(RTÉ One, May 2022), short film on gender violence during the Irish Civil War for Mná100, and was on the UCC editorial team for RTE’s landmark three part series The Civil War (2022).

Video links:

Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/1060925212/08ac1dc373

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQZ2P49eghg