Mr. Ciarán Lawler:

As was referenced earlier, it depends on whether you are looking forward or backwards. I know that a number of witnesses have brought up this issue over recent weeks. If you look backwards to see what the rate of inflation was over the previous 12 months in order to use that information to forecast increases in the social welfare rates for the following year - and I am talking about inflation in prices alone and not about earnings - you will see that the rate of inflation was actually negative. However, the forecast at budget time was the rate would be just over 2%. For a normal working-age payment of €203, an additional 2% would have been worth €4. In the subsequent period, the rate of inflation has increased to 5% or 6%. The last forecast I saw suggested it will average at 4% over the course of the year. If you had that information about the next few months available to you at the time the rates increased, that 5% would have equated to €10 while 4% would have equated to €8 for those on a jobseeker's payment. However, that information was not available last September and October.