Mr. Pádraig Dalton:

The first action the integrated European social statistics, IESS, regulation is trying to do is to harmonise the definitions of particular variables across surveys. Currently, one has a regulation for the labour force survey and a separate regulation for the SILC. Taking a simple example, the definition for a "usual resident", the primary basis for the people covered in a survey, differs from that in the labour force survey to the one in the SILC. That creates problems when one is trying to correlate it on an aggregate level between labour market data and data on SILC. One of the key things they are trying to do at European level, which we support, is to ensure standard definitions for these core concepts and topics and that the same definitions apply across all the surveys.

A respondent is in the SILC for four years. There are two parts to the survey. There is the pure cross-sectional part which is where we provide statistics for a given year. Then there is the longitudinal component where one is trying to track changes over time by taking a cohort of people and monitoring how their circumstances change over time. In Ireland, we have three waves for the first three years and then one rotates out at the end of the fourth year. The proposal at European level is to move this to six waves. The problem we have with all surveys of this nature, not just in Ireland, is that one is trying to recruit people into a survey. One is accessing information on sensitive topics such as income, material deprivation and measuring consistent poverty. The first problem we face is recruiting households into a survey. Once they are recruited, like every other country, the attrition rate is quite high because of the sensitive nature of the topics. As one moves through the four years, the coverage of the longitudinal component reduces. Imagine going to a doorstep and asking someone to engage with the survey for six years. The concern we have, as do other member states, is the shift from a four-wave approach to a six-wave approach.

We will retain total autonomy of the SILC. The SILC is a long survey, taking about an hour to go through it. One is trying to engage householders who are busy and it takes place in the evening. The proposal is now to include detailed questions on wealth, on top of an already difficult survey. Our view is that this is not the appropriate place to capture wealth. The appropriate place to capture wealth is in a dedicated survey. This is currently organised by the European Central Bank, ECB. The CSO undertook the first wealth survey, the household finance and consumption survey, with support from the Central Bank in Ireland. That is an incredibly difficult survey, looking for access to information on income, which is current, but also on equities, deposits, house ownership and so forth. It is a very difficult survey. Trying to put wealth on top of a survey on income and living conditions is not feasible or sensible. We are not the only ones who feel that way. We will have to see how this proposal progresses through the co-decision process.