Ms Maria Graham:

On the question of water poverty, when charges were being contemplated the ESRI did some work for the Department on water poverty and examining income distribution at different charge levels and what the impact might be. Several interesting points arose in the work. There was not a cohort of people potentially facing water poverty who were the same as an existing cohort of people in the social protection system. For instance, the fuel allowance people would not be the same as people who potentially would face water poverty. Water poverty tends to be looked at as water charges being more than 3% to 5% of income. The outcome of the work done by an interdepartmental group which included the Department and the Department of Social Protection was in the context of developing a free allowance, in the sense that if a universal free allowance was set at a percentage it would ensure people were not brought into this category. The charges as they are, compared to average industrial income, are less than 1%. These tests have been done.