Hysteria and the poor mouth are among the many enemies of reasoned debate. Both have long bedeviled debate on the issue of single parent families. The hysteria has, largely, targeted single mothers. That there are 34,000 women receiving what used to be called the Unmarried Mothers' Allowance is regularly put forward as a cause for alarm: the phenomenon, we are assured, threatens the fabric of society, law and and all that.
Begrudgery comes into it too. Young women, we live for the next 18 years on social enjoying "free this, free that, free everything". The poor mouth is the other side of the coin.
Here the single mother, deserted or widowed parent is, portrayed as a victim weighed down by misery and for whom the skies are clouded even on the brightest day. The responsibility for portraying the victim image of single parenthood rests with journalists and with" social campaigners. Too often, while making a case or reporting it, they forget that there is another side.
That other side comes out strongly in Mr Tony McCashin's Lone Mothers in Ireland, based on extended interviews with 53 women in the Coolock area, of Dublin. What is portrayed here are women who, prize their self reliance and independence even though, the price is financial hardship. Far from being dragged, down by their children, they love and enjoy them. They have no desire to spend the rest of their lives living on the State. They look forward to working when their children are older - sooner in the case of those who want to move out of their parents homes and live, independently. The experience of living and surviving independently has, in many cases, reinforced these women's wish to get jobs or training for jobs.
The report does not shirk the fact that making ends meet is a constant struggle for them. But it explodes myths and gives us a fuller picture of a type of family unit which is becoming more common. The virtual disappearance of adoption as an option for single pregnant women is due, this report suggests, to the encouragement which they receive from their own parents and not to the doubtful lure of living on welfare. This change, from insistence on adoption of children born out of wedlock to assurance that there is no need to give their children up, has occurred in the past 30 years.
There are signs that the more powerful institutions of society are taking this change on board in very real ways. The Department of Social Welfare will, from January, allow lone parents to earn £6,000 a year without losing anything from their allowance. They can earn up to £12,000 and still get a partial allowance. The purpose of this is to make it feasible for these people mostly women - to get paid employment. This will apply to lone parents regardless of how they come to be alone, whether through marriage breakdown or single parenthood for instance.
The other sign that things are changing or that change is being acknowledged - comes in what we know of the forthcoming report of the Government's Constitution Review Group, chaired by Dr TK Whitaker. That report, it is believed, will urge that the Constitution enshrine respect for the family, "whether based on marriage or not". Perhaps we are, at last, becoming more willing to face reality and finding that reality, when faced, is not necessarily as frightening as we fear. This excellent report does much to help in that process and deserves to be read by all who pronounce on the topic.