Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 13 Dec 2000

Vol. 528 No. 2

Written Answers. - Social Welfare Budget.

Jack Wall

Ceist:

33 Mr. Wall asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the way in which the Irish social welfare budget compares to the other 14 EU nations in terms of the percentage of GDP and the percentage of GDP in the years since 1995. [29714/00]

Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs (Mr. D. Ahern)

Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU, publishes comparisons of social protection expenditure across the different EU member states.

As well as encompassing social welfare expenditure, social protection expenditure, as defined by Eurostat, also covers expenditure in other areas such as health care, social housing, employment support programmes, e.g. certain FÁS programmes, and other social exclusion programmes. This is clearly a very different definition to "social welfare" as we understand it in this country.

The latest year for which this information is available in 1998, and so it does not take into account the very substantial increases in social welfare payments which this Government introduced in 1999 and 2000. Neither, of course, does it take account of the record increases for 2001 which we announced in last week's budget.

I am, however, arranging to have the Eurostat table circulated with the official report. It shows that social protection – broadly defined, as set out above – in Ireland represents a lower proportion of GDP than the EU average: the proportion in Ireland is 16%, compared to an EU average of 27.7%.

Some important points must be remembered in interpreting this. First, we have a relatively young population compared to most of our EU neighbours. Not alone does this mean our pension costs are lower, but we also have lower costs on health care and caring generally.

Second, the measurement of social protection expenditure by Eurostat also includes expenditure on occupational pension and benefit systems. While occupational pensions and benefits play an important role in the overall social protection system in Ireland, information on the significant amount of expenditure involved is not currently available for Ireland. Accordingly the figures provided by Eurostat for social protection expenditure seriously understate the actual level of expenditure involved in this country as compared with other EU member states.

Third, the figures are based on GDP, but it is recognised that in Ireland GNP, rather than GDP, is the better measure of the income available to society. The figures based on GDP therefore understate the proportion of our income that is spent on social protection.

Expenditure in EU Member States on Social

Protection as a percentage of GDP

Country	1995	1996	1997*	1998*
Austria	29.8	29.6	28.8	28.4
Belgium	28.4	28.8	28.5	27.5
Denmark	33.4	32.5	31.4	30.0
Finland	32.7	32.3	29.9	27.2
France	30.7	31.0	30.8	30.5
Germany	29.6	30.6	29.9	29.3
Greece	22.6	23.1	23.6	24.5
Ireland	19.6	18.5	17.5	16.1
Italy	25.0	25.3	25.9	25.2
Luxembourg	24.9	25.2	24.8	24.1
Netherlands	31.5	30.8	30.3	28.5
Portugal	20.8	21.6	22.5	23.4
Spain	22.1	21.9	21.4	21.6
Sweden	35.3	34.6	33.7	33.3
United Kingdom	27.7	27.7	26.8	26.8

*Provisional