Minister for Social Protection Regina Doherty has given a strong indication that the Budget will not see a repeat of the €5 increase to all weekly social welfare payments announced in last year's budget.
Minister Doherty is not ruling anything out at this stage but she has pledged to be "practical and realistic" and wants to address the problem of 112,000 children living in consistent poverty.
Along with Minister of State Finian McGrath, she hosted a pre-Budget forum with interest groups and NGOs in the sector at Dublin Castle today.
She stressed that negotiations on Budget 2019 have not yet commenced but added: "My job is to be practical and realistic. Given that there is only €800 million to spend and there is a ratio of 2:1 and I don't have first dibs on everything that is left, I think that I have to be pragmatic about it."
She said Government needs to "have a proper conversation" about the limited amount of money it has and look at the cost of policy changes in her department.
WATCH: Social Protection Minister Regina Doherty gives strong indication October Budget will not see a repeat of last year's €5 increase to all weekly social welfare payments .She's not ruling anything out but pledges to address 112,000 children living in consistent poverty pic.twitter.com/OIkvZ9ZnpG
— RTÉ Politics (@rtepolitics) July 20, 2018
The minister said: "I am not ruling anything in or out but if you have an acknowledgement and an acceptance that we are going to do what we have done for the last number of years, which was increase all payments by €5, that tots up to about €343 million. It doesn't leave much of the €800m when you break down the ratio of 2:1. So I am trying to be realistic and practical.
"But I am very conscious that every time we sit down and have round table discussions with NGOs there are 112,000 children living in consistent poverty. That number is not coming down. The reason it is not coming down is because we are not addressing it and attacking it. That is something that I am very conscious of doing this year. "
"We have targets to take those children out of child poverty by 2020 and that is only two years away. So if we don't do something significant this year we are not going to reach that target and that is not something I can sit easy with.
"It is not just my department, there have to be significant changes in other departments. That is not a criticism of anybody. We are all collectively responsible for those 112,000 and it means significant action has to be taken," said the Meath East TD.
She added: "It's not rocket science. We know the challenges that single income, low income and no income families are facing on a daily basis and we just have to try and address this."
Ms Doherty also said that significant policy changes are needed in her department including extending paid parental leave to both parents for six weeks each.
She noted that people who are self-employed, and who earn above a certain means, do not get supported by jobseekers’ payments in the same way as employed people do.
She added: "We have to have a conversation around the people who are caring 24/7 in this country and who potentially don't get recognised by the State financially."
