Ms Gayle Smith:

On the point about local authorities, two local authorities currently disregard child maintenance when assessing rent - Dublin City Council and Cork County Council recently. All the rest count child maintenance as means even through the Department of Social Protection sees it as a child poverty prevention measure. I do not always have good things to say about Dublin City Council but it was the first. It was not even asked. When the Minister last year made that decision to disregard child maintenance as means, Dublin City Council made the move itself to follow on with that. Its HAP tenants and social housing tenants are not assessed with child maintenance, which is a great help.