Cost of living: Increase to social welfare needed, advocacy group says

An increase of €27 a week in core social welfare rates and pensions is required to deal with current inflationary trends, Social Justice Ireland has said.

“This is simply to bring these payments back to where they were 15 years ago, before the bank crash. This is what is required to protect the most vulnerable as the cost of living rises,” said the advocacy group’s director Fr Seán Healy.

Speaking as the group published its latest publication Social Justice Matters: 2022 Guide to a Fairer Ireland, Fr Healy said: “A new social contract ensuring wellbeing for all is needed.”

“The rising cost of living is felt most by those in the bottom 20 per cent of the income distribution. These households spend a larger proportion of their income on food and energy,” he said.

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The cost of living crisis is “an income adequacy crisis”, he said. The government’s initiatives to address it, while welcome, are “deeply inadequate and not sufficiently targeted to those in greatest need”,

A new social contract is required “to deliver the standard of living that people expect, and to comprehensively resolve the problems we have in areas such as low pay, housing, healthcare, energy, public transport, climate and childcare, all of which impact on people’s wellbeing and on their capacity to cope with inflation and its related consequences”, he said.

Social Justice Ireland research and policy analyst Michelle Murphy said "a robust social dialogue structure involving all stakeholders" would help the Government ensure resources intended to address rising energy costs were directed at those most in need.

It would also assist Government in “delivering housing, healthcare and other vital services to everyone, including those fleeing war,” she said. It would also “go a long way towards addressing persistently high levels of poverty and social exclusion while meeting our climate targets and protecting those most impacted.”

However, this would not work if it excluded “groups such as farmers, the community and voluntary sector and environmental groups,” she said. In the absence of real social dialogue at national level “the strongest can fight their corner in the open market or in the political realm, while the weakest will be left behind”.

“Inequality, already at unacceptable levels, will continue to grow and the integrated development, that is required to address the challenges in housing, healthcare and meeting our climate targets, will not be achieved,” she said.