An Oireachtas Committee with a Government majority has called on Mary Hanafin to reject a high level recommendation to end the independence of the State's poverty watchdog.
The Joint Committee on Social and Family Affairs unanimously passed a motion urging the Minister for Social Affairs to safeguard the Combat Poverty's Agency's independence.
The motion urged her not to proceed with a proposal by a Government ordered review to integrate the agency with her department.
The Committee instead urged Ms Hanafin to consider locating the CPA in the independent National Economic and Social Development Office.
The vote is seen as an embarrassment for the Government which had ordered the review by seven Government departments at its first Cabinet meeting last year.
