Dear Taoiseach I have set up this petition to ask you not to cut children's allowance payments as proposed in the Commission on Taxation report. It is simply incredible that you and your governmet can pump billions of euro into banks which have dragged this country into the gutter, yet slash vital bebefits for the next generation. Children's allowance is a universal paymnet which the parents of every child in this land depend greatly. We are imcensed that, as parents, the government should see fit to either cut or means test it. Everyone understands the hugely difficult circumstances in which this country finds itself. Many of us have made sacrafices, cut our cloth,and taken pay decreasesin order to get this country back in the black. Yet against this backdrop, we have watched in disbelief as some of your own collegues have squandered MILLIONS OF OUR MONEY. We know Taoiseach, about the foreign trips in five star hotels, the chauffer rides between airport terminals, the cash doled out to pay luggage carriers...... All claimed in unvouched expenses. ALL PAID BY US. Dispite this, and countless other examples of financial incompetence, you want the very people raising the generation that will drag Ireland out of this recession to pay the price for the despicable waste PArents do not use their childrens allowance on luxuries, rather to put food on the table, to clothe their childrenand to pay household bills. It has become a critical part of most families income. But you dont have to worry about that as you have your high wages and expenses to fall back on. The ordinary joe soap doesnt. Shame on you and your Government if you procede to raid the already depleted wallets and purses of the hard pressed parents across the land Meddle with this allowance at your peril. Mr Cowen. FUture generations will never forgive you.