Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)
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Question 114: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs his views on whether it is time to develop a new longer term benchmark against which the evolution of social welfare rates can be measured. [25888/07]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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The appropriateness of benchmarking social welfare rates has been actively considered from time to time.

In 2001 the Social Welfare Benchmarking and Indexation Group was established to examine the issues involved in developing a benchmark for adequacy of adult and child social welfare payments. The Group published its final report in September 2001 but did not achieve a consensus position on the desirability of establishing a formal benchmark.

The illustrative benchmark options examined in the report included 30% of Gross Average Industrial Earnings and 50% of Average Weekly Household Income.

The Group could not agree about which of these would be the better option as there were advantages and disadvantages associated with each.

The report provides a valuable resource for the assessment of the implications of adopting particular approaches to the up rating of social welfare payments and was considered by Government as part of the review of the National Anti-Poverty Strategy (NAPS) in 2002. Recognising that the exact rate was a matter for Government, the Strategy set a target of €150 per week (in 2002 terms) for the lowest social welfare payments to be met by 2007. This target was achieved in this year's Budget.

The current social partnership agreement, Towards 2016, commits the Government and social partners to working together to achieve the NAPS target and to maintaining the value of the lowest social welfare rates at this level over the course of the agreement, subject to available resources.