Susan O'Keeffe (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for that very useful overview. Those figures are encouraging. We do not often consider poverty rates in that way and think of them as having improved despite the difficulties elsewhere.

A petition that came before us related to recognising the importance of work in the home, an issue about which the Minister has spoken previously.

The changes were introduced over a very short period of time without providing any mechanism for people to make up the shortfall in the required contributions. The committee would like to know whether steps would be taken to ensure there would be a sufficient time lag before the introduction of the new criteria in order to protect people from being caught between the old and the new requirements. Will the Minister comment on that in the first instance? The nature of the work of this committee is to try to deal with issues that are of interest across a wide spectrum, not just an individual's story, even though quite clearly in the case of this petitioner, it is her individual story.