Our Vision
One Family believes in an Ireland where every family is cherished equally, and is enabled to enjoy the social, financial and legal equality to create their own positive futures.
Our Mission
One Family is working to ensure a positive and equal future for people parenting alone, sharing parenting and parenting around separation – changing attitudes, policies, services and lives. We are committed to achieving equality and respect for all families. While acknowledging that every family is unique, we will endeavour to bring about better lives for these parents and children.
In addition to striving for fundamental attitudinal and structural change in our society, our services offer support in a family-centred way to individual families through times of change and difficulty, as well as supporting those experiencing a crisis pregnancy.
Our Values
Respect, compassion for and acceptance of the parents, children and organisations that we come in contact with are at the heart of what we do. We connect with others in a relationship of equals and are completely non-judgmental.
We believe that we can hold the hope for the families we work with, especially when they are unable to. We achieve this through innovation, excellence, accountability and our family-centred approach.
Since being founded as Cherish in 1972, One Family has been an organisation of determination, passion and courage, working with integrity towards achieving equality for all families in Ireland.
How will our vision become a reality?
One Family is an organisation that develops and critiques policies, as well as being a specialist service provider. We focus on delivering positive policy and attitudinal change for the families we represent at a national level. This focus on improving the lives of one-parent families is fundamental to our work. We want Ireland to have achieved the following by 2030:
- Child poverty rates in Ireland will be dramatically reduced as Government reaches its child poverty target through a range of universal and targeted services; targeted income transfers; inclusive employment and educational opportunities; and the necessary targeting of one-parent families for additional supports based on available evidence.
- Family support services will be available for people parenting alone, sharing parenting, and separating so that conflict and disruptions are minimised for children. This includes the development of a new Court Welfare Service including a Child Maintenance Service; accessible services for separating families and people who are sharing parenting of their children; and targeted family supports for vulnerable one-parent families.
- One-parent families will be widely recognised, understood and celebrated as positive family forms. The marginalisation of diverse families needs to end and all families need equal access to statutory services, policies and laws. We would like this reflected in our Constitution so that all families are protected and respected.
“One Family is Ireland’s national organisation for one-parent families. We work with all types and all members of one-parent families, respecting the realities of family life, to affect positive change and achieve equality and social inclusion for all one-parent families in Ireland.”
— Karen Kiernan, CEO
