Ms Issy Petrie:

In terms of targeting versus universal increases, both contribute to the total adequacy of the household income. There is a different balance in building up towards adequacy, depending on the household. Targeted increases are obviously very important in recognising specific costs, such as the specific costs of a child; we were pleased to see high rates introduced for older children a couple of years ago. However, increasing core social welfare rates is vital to recognising that it is the total household adequacy that is responsible for lifting families out of poverty.

As regards setting those rates, we very much advocate benchmarking them to the minimum essential standard of living as calculated by the Vincentian Partnership for Social Justice, because that empirically reflects the actual cost of living. Anything short of that builds in an ongoing inadequacy week after week. That gap between adequacy and income is coming in as a cost and that cost builds up week after week. Looking back at last year's figures, the Vincentian partnership recommended an increase to the core rate of around €10. That was to begin a pathway to reaching full adequacy by 2025. Since we did not get that, we would obviously have to go further this year in order to continue on that pathway of reaching adequacy by 2025. Does Ms Kielthy want to add anything to that?