Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 18 April 2019
290. Deputy Willie O'Dea asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her targets for poverty, including child poverty; if these targets are being met; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [18118/19]
View answerThe National Social Target for Poverty Reduction was agreed by Government in 2012 and aimed to reduce consistent poverty from 6.3% in 2010 to 4% by 2016 (interim target) and to 2% or less by 2020. This was an ambitious target, particularly during a time of economic recession, but one to which the Government remained committed.
Data from the CSO Survey on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) show that consistent poverty rose sharply from the 2010 level, to a peak of 9.0% in 2013. However the most recent SILC data from 2017 show that this had reduced to 6.7%. While this is a welcome decrease, a reduction of over 4 percentage points will now be required to meet the 2020 poverty target of 2%.
There are two other components of the National Social Target for Poverty Reduction:
(i) The Irish contribution to the Europe 2020 poverty target: to reduce by a minimum of 200,000 the population in 'combined poverty' (i.e. those in consistent poverty or at-risk-of-poverty or experiencing basic deprivation) between 2010 and 2020.
The population affected by ‘combined poverty’ was 27.8 per cent in 2017, compared to 29 per cent in 2016. Nominally, this equated to 1.33 million people and represents a decrease of 80,000 people on the 2010 baseline figure. Thus, over 120,000 people will have to be lifted out of combined poverty by 2020 to meet the Europe 2020 target. It should be noted that this rate increased to 1.74 million people in 2013 compared to the 1.4 million 2010 baseline figures and thus the current rate represents a decrease of nearly 400,000 people on the 2013 rate.
(ii) The child-specific poverty target: to lift over 70,000 children (aged 0-17 years) out of consistent poverty by 2020, a reduction of at least two-thirds on the 2011 level.
The number of children in consistent poverty rose significantly from the 2011 baseline figure of 107,000 to a high of 152,000 in 2014. The 2017 SILC data indicate that there were 105,000 children in consistent poverty in 2017, a decrease of 25,000 children on 2016. This means that a revised figure of 68,000 children have to be lifted out of consistent poverty to meet the target by 2020.
Given the continuing economic recovery and measures introduced in Budgets 2018 and 2019, I expect the figures for 2018 and 2019, when they become available, to show further improvement over the 2017 outcomes. I will continue to work with my Government colleagues to ensure that the economic recovery is experienced in all regions and by all families, households and individuals.
