Ms Joan O'Donnell:

I have four very brief points to make. They are all concerned with social protection, income and employment measures to ensure better equality proofing of budgets. To build on the statistics that Dr. McCarthy and Ms O'Donovan have shared, 154,351 people with a disability in Ireland live in consistent poverty. That is one of the highest rates of any group. These figures are based on income figures. They are not based on goods and services and how much money these people need to pay out. This grossly underestimates the number of people in Ireland living in consistent poverty who have a disability. This very much needs to be addressed in equality budgeting and disability proofing budgets. We welcome the measures undertaken by the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Deputy Regina Doherty, to look at the cost of disability and caring. There is an urgent need for any work done under that to be stitched into equality budgeting.

We would also like to comment on the Minister's intention to benchmark social welfare payments. We believe they should be based on the minimum essential standard of living, on which a lot of work has been done by the Vincentian Partnership for Social Justice, rather than being tied to the consumer price index. The issue of income adequacy needs to be addressed in a way that will lift people above the poverty line and ensure that people's dignity and rights to a minimum income are secured. This is provided for under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities as well as the European Pillar of Social Rights. This states that people have a right to live with dignity and to an adequate minimum income that raises them above the poverty line. The consumer price index is of little relevance to the lived circumstances of people with disabilities who are reliant on social welfare. The Central Statistics Office concurs that it is not a reflection of the cost of living and acts purely as a price index. The Vincentian Partnership for Social Justice has done a lot of work on a minimum essential standard of living, which we would advocate instead.

We need to keep in mind measures for people with disabilities who wish to work and who could stay in work. It is very hard for people with disabilities to enter the workforce. They are more likely to leave employment than to enter it. They are also twice as likely to leave a job and to exit the labour force as those without a disability. Today's report mentions some of the measures of the Make Work Pay report as being implemented. There are 24 recommendations in that report and only three of them are mentioned as being progressed. Regarding equality budgeting, we ask for recommendation No. 3, which provides for reasonable accommodation to be reviewed, and access to adequate aids, appliances and assistive technology in the workplace, to be revisited. Work adaption grants and the whole concept of reasonable accommodation should be revised to make them fit for purpose.

I will leave my comments there. I am very happy to answer any questions on any of them.