Costello pledges to restore poverty agency

POVERTY AND EXCLUSION:THE ABOLITION of the Combat Poverty Agency (CPA) was condemned by Labour Party European Affairs spokesman Joe Costello, who pledged that in Government the party would restore it.

He told the party’s national conference in Galway that the party had a track record second to none in tackling poverty and social exclusion. “Frank Cluskey, former leader of the Labour Party, established the Combat Poverty Agency in 1974. Thirty-five years later Fianna Fáil and the Green Party abolished it,” he said.

Mr Costello said that in 1975 the Labour Party had taken the CPA concept to Europe and convinced the EEC to take it on board, much against the wishes of Germany at the time.

“It has continued to inform EU strategy on poverty and social exclusion ever since.

“In 2000, it became an integral part of the 10-year Lisbon strategy, which ended this year.

“Now, appropriately, 2010 is the European Year of Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion. The EU Commission is finalising the new European 20:20 strategy for the next decade.”

He said that with 79 million people in the EU in poverty or at risk of poverty, including 19 million children, it was essential that the proposed target of a 25 per cent reduction in poverty levels over 10 years be set at the beginning of the new 20:20 strategy.

“Such a poverty reduction target, with built-in strategies for delivery, would lift 20 million people out of poverty and reconnect people to the EU as a body relevant to their needs.”