If the Government is serious about tackling poverty, it should invest all of the £5 billion surplus it is said to have on the problem, says Father Sean Healy of the Conference of Religious in Ireland (CoRI).
"There is a growing awareness of poverty not being tackled effectively," he says. "And this massive surplus represents an opportunity to fund a major anti-poverty programme."
Attacking the National Anti-Poverty Strategy target to reduce consistent poverty to below 5 per cent by 2004 as "too soft", he calls for a "total elimination" target which would be to the benefit of everybody.
Setting out a detailed programme, Father Healy argues that tax credits should be refundable; "social economy" employment should be developed; housing waiting lists should be reduced to 18 months; there should be a huge investment in education; and the tax system should be overhauled to target those that have most to spend, a tax on Internet transactions, for example.
Mike Allen of the Irish National Organisation of the Unemployed is dubious about whether inequality can be definitively tackled, pointing out that of the states surveyed in the UN report, only Ireland was unable to give an estimate of wealth distribution.
"That's how hidden the wealth of Ireland's wealthy is, and there is little sign of the Government seeking to address that."
If it were serious about addressing it he suggests it would exempt the financial institutions from the reduction in corporation tax, from 30 to 12 per cent.
All to whom The Irish Times spoke were concerned that, at 10-12 per cent, the increase in social welfare payments has fallen far behind the 22 per cent growth in incomes between 1994 and 1997.
Unless social welfare payments were linked to average income growth, says Hugh Frazer of Combat Poverty, progress made on reducing deprivation would be "eroded".
All also believed there should be greater investment in developing communities' own means of addressing their deprivation, as "agents of their own change".
Prof James Wickham of Trinity College's Department of Sociology is pessimistic, however, about how radically the Government will intervene in the market place to address poverty.
Ireland, he says, has chosen an Anglo-American model of economic planning, rejecting that associated with high levels of socio-market planning as adopted in Germany and France.
Deregulation, he says, typically leads to "high levels of inequality".
Many people concerned with levels of poverty in Ireland discern a drift in public mood away from concern at the problem.
The veteran economist, J.K. Galbraith, wrote on the subject in last year's UN report.
He observed: "As people become fortunate in their personal well-being, and as countries become similarly fortunate, there is a common tendency to ignore the poor. Or to develop some kind of rationalisation for the good fortune of the fortunate. Poverty is inevitable and in some measure deserved.
"The fortunate individuals and fortunate countries enjoy their well-being without the burden of conscience, without a troublesome sense of responsibility. This is something I did not recognise writing 40 years ago; it is a habit of mind to which I would now attribute major responsibility."
