Dr. Karina Doorley:

On the means test, we designed this proposed reform - and it is definitely not the only way it could be designed - by piggybacking on the working family payment. All this means is that we would remove the work requirement from the working family payment. It then becomes a means-tested payment for all families with children. The means-testing itself is exactly the same as what is done in the context of the working family payment. This means a family gets 60% of the difference between their weekly income and the income threshold, and that income threshold depends on how many children they have. That is how we do the means-testing. If a policy like this was introduced, we estimate it would reduce the child-at-risk-of-poverty rate by 4.6 percentage points. This is a fairly sizeable decrease and higher than what we estimate for any of the other proposed reforms that cost the same.

On whether we should have statutory targets for child poverty, we are not hitting our targets now. I do not know if having a statutory target in this area would make it more important to hit the target. I do not know what it would depend on, but perhaps Mr. MaÌtre would like to comment.