Mr. Niall Egan:

Because of the issue Mr. McKeon identified, there is a discrepancy between the labour force surveys and the data from the survey on income and living conditions, SILC, on jobless households. The Department has asked the ESRI to do a further analysis so we can get better information. The purpose of this is for us to be better informed about those whom we are talking about. We know largely who they are: lone parents, disabled cohorts and jobseekers. Because they are not particularly visible in the system, it is vital that we know who they are and get a better handle on that, and it ties in with what we are discussing today.

The advisory group on tax and social welfare is doing its fourth and final report on making work pay. The goal is that people in receipt of a social welfare payment will always be able to take up work that pays more than social welfare. One of the key issues in the report is that of qualified adults' current situation in the social welfare system. Many of the proposals raised today will be raised in that context and will be considered by the advisory group. The administrative individualisation issues will be examined in that context. It will probably set out the guide for the future. It will take the Department time to get there because, as Mr. McKeon said, given the scale of the jobseeker population on which we are focused, our priority cohorts in terms of the youth guarantee commitments include, the long-term unemployed, the Pathways to Work targets and those in receipt of the new jobseeker's allowance transition payment, with whom we are engaging for the first time, as well as lone parents on an activation basis. We already have to deal with a huge group. That does not mean there is no opportunity to use the jobseeker's allowance transition model as a way of possibly increasing the visibility, particularly of qualified adults, in terms of an activation agenda. We are considering this.