Families in Ireland 2008
FAMILIES IN IRELAND an analysis of patterns and trends
The family, in its different forms, is in a constant state of change and is an issue for a number of areas of public policy. In order to inform discussion of family issues, it is therefore useful to take stock and attempt to gain an overview of where family life now stands. The purpose of this document, which has been prepared at the request of the Family Affairs Unit in the Department of Social and family Affairs, is to do that. It aims to bring together a range of information on central aspects of family life and highlight key features and trends.
The topics covered in the report can be classified under three broad headings: partnership, including marriage and cohabitation, parents and children and other care-giving relationships in the family. Following a period of decline in marriage rates during the 1980s and early 1990s, the incidence of marriage has increased in the past decade, with 40 per cent more marriages in 2006 than in 1995. A decline in marriage rates among young adults has been off-set to some degree by a rise in cohabitation.
In general, however, cohabitation is more often either a transient arrangement that dissolves or a stage on the road to marriage rather than a long-term alternative to marriage. At the same time the divorce rate in
Ireland today is low by international standards.
A striking feature of family life over the past ten years, highlighted in the report, has been the large increase in the formation of new families, as indicated by a rise of 57 per cent in the numbers of first births between 1994 and 2006. At the same time the traditional larger family has declined. Children in Ireland are now much more likely than in previous decades to grow up in households with only one or two children. Accompanying these changes has been the steady increase in the numbers of children living in lone parent families, and by 2006, according to census data, 17.6 per cent of children aged under 15 were in that situation.
The caring function of families remains strong, as expressed not only through the care of parents for their children but also through other caring relationships in the family.
The report successfully assembles a range of key information on families in Ireland and is a valuable resource for policy makers and those interested in how families are developing and changing in Ireland and the future supports they will need.
I would like to thank Tony Fahey and Catherine Anne Field of UCD who wrote the report and the Family Affairs Unit in my Department who supported their work and drew together the information on family services and programmes provided by other departments and agencies, which is being published alongside the report.
In ainneoin na hathruithe ar fad sa tír tá an chlann lárnach inár sochaí. Caithfimid tacaíocht a thabhairt di sa todhchaí.
Mary Hanafin T.D.
Minister for Social & Family Affairs
November 2008