Ms Louise Bayliss:

What we have seen through the MESL research - Mr. Thornton may be able to address some of those issues – is that the support towards children is the lowest from social protection. Where the needs of infants and preschool children are concerned, it amounts to 115% and 113%, respectively, of their needs. It is 88% from ages five to 12 whereas only 64% of a teenager's needs are met by social protection.

What we see is that if there is a deficit in the core social protection, people are not only just dealing with their own deficit, they are also subsidising their children and that is what is causing families with children, especially older children, to fall into this steep poverty. That is why we were really pushing for a children's budget. In many ways, we did get the child support payment, which is very welcome. However, we did not get some of the really important increases we needed in the core social welfare rate. Mr.Thornton and I have been doing a few case studies and we looked for €16 on the core social welfare rate and €9.50 on the fuel allowance. That was based on the facts and the MESL research. If we had got that, in every situation, even with the increases in child support payment, our rates would have meant the family was better off. The support did get directed to the children but when the once-off payments were taken off and the structural change was not made to the core social welfare rate, it has meant that it is moving the money around the family. It is directing it towards children but the family with children is itself still worse off. Mr. Thornton may want to say something about the MESL data.