John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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117. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her views on Ireland’s level of income inequality as found in the recent European Union survey on income and living conditions data, including progress to meet the National Social Target for Poverty Reduction; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [24670/22]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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145. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the findings of the latest survey on income and living conditions data and the impact that her Department’s income supports have had on these findings; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [24225/22]

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 117 and 145 together.

The Survey on Income and Living Conditions contains the official poverty data for Ireland. The most recent survey results (SILC 2021) were published by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on 6 May 2022.

The Roadmap for Social Inclusion 2020–2025 is the national strategy for poverty reduction and social inclusion. The ambitious headline target is to reduce the percentage of the population in consistent poverty to 2% or less by 2025.

SILC 2021 shows that there have been improvements across the key national poverty indicators. The rate of consistent poverty decreased by a 0.7 percentage points to 4%. Government welcomes this steady progress towards meeting the national social target for poverty reduction. In addition, child poverty also decreased significantly – from 7.2% in SILC 2020 to 5.2% in SILC 2021.

Data from SILC 2021 highlights the protective effect that social transfers have on poverty. Without social transfers, the at risk of poverty rate would have been 38.6%. Social transfers reduced this rate to 11.6%. This represents a 70% reduction on the at risk of poverty rate in 2021. Ireland is consistently one of the best performing EU countries in reducing poverty through social transfers.

The survey results also show that social welfare and COVID-19 income supports were key in sustaining incomes. Without COVID-19 income supports, average household incomes would have fallen by 6.2%. As a result of COVID-19 income supports, average household incomes actually increased by 5.2%. It is particularly welcome that household disposable incomes increased across all income deciles.

The SILC 2021 report also calculated the Gini coefficient, which is a measure of income inequality where a smaller number represents greater income equality. It found income equality had improved in Ireland (improving from 28.5% in SILC 2020 to 27% in SILC 2021) and that social transfers played a key role in this. Without social transfers, the Gini coefficient would have been 43.4%.

Combined with the other SILC 2021 findings, the reduction in income inequality displays the effectiveness of Ireland’s social welfare system at both redistributing income and reducing poverty.