Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am delighted to hear of that engagement and not surprised because I see many of the same principles reflected. The concern is not the impact of the minimum essential standards of living in respect of the ISI's calculations, but in the other direction - not on the Vincentian partnership but in respect of our social protection system.

There is a conversation I am hoping to start and I am happy if the Minister can give an indication on this. He has told me of the conversation between the Vincentian Partnership and the ISI and I will monitor that. Long before I came to these Houses, when I worked with the National Women's Council of Ireland, I worked with the Vincentian partnership around that process. It is about the conversation between Departments and ensuring those kinds of detailed conversations on what is needed in terms of childcare costs and so forth, how they are calculated and reflected. Childcare is not really captured by our social protection payment system. There are child payments but there is not childcare or the guarantee of public access to childcare whereas there is an allowance in respect of childcare and its private costs, which is reflected in the reasonable living expenses. That is just one example.

This is about ensuring that conversation is two-way and there is some movement not just in the ISI and its annual review but that there is a conversation that goes into the Department of Social Protection reflecting this new revision of the minimum essential standard of living. Sometimes that minimum essential standard of living will not be achieved directly by income. Some of it will be achieved by services. That is the case in the context of reasonable living expenses as well, but in that instance allowance is made for presuming private access, while for those on social protection payments, there is a requirement to get public access to those services.

I am happy not to press the amendment but I ask the Minister of State to indicate that there will be some engagement with the Department of Social Protection to discuss how it is engaging with these issues and with the Vincentian partnership on that review, how it is learning from the additional factors the ISI have brought to bear when they think about certain households in a difficult situation in Ireland and perhaps looking at how those might be reflected.Social protection payments are not always long term. That is an example of a somewhat insidious assumption that there is a kind of person who is on a social protection payment. Almost everybody in Ireland will be on a social protection payment at some point in life. It is just like when we hear about taxpayers. Every person in Ireland pays tax and VAT. There is not a category of people who are taxpayers and a category of people who receive the social protection payment. We are the same people, families and households facing various kinds of challenging circumstances over the course of a life. It is about extending across government the joined-up thinking that is clearly taking place in the research bodies, and how we use that research.

I am happy to withdraw the amendment. Will the Minister of State engage with the Department of Social Protection in that conversation?