Community and voluntary bodies hope to make significant progress today on measures to tackle poverty, in talks on a successor to Partnership 2000.
While employers and unions remain deadlocked on pay, the "fourth pillar" will be seeking commitments from the Government that families on social welfare will be assured of incomes worth at least 50 per cent of the national average.
This would require increases of roughly 15 per cent for those primarily dependent on social welfare.
With the focus of media attention on pay talks and the withdrawal of the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland from the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, there has been growing concern in the voluntary and community sectors that the State's most marginalised groups will be forgotten at the negotiating table.
Today representatives from these sectors are meeting senior officials of the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs to discuss how the National Anti-Poverty Strategy will operate under any new agreement. ICTU representatives will also attend the talks.
No serious difficulty is anticipated in all sides agreeing in principle that people on social welfare should receive half the average national income. This would bring everyone above the official "poverty line", as defined by the Economic and Social Research Institute.
However, the actual mechanism for doing so could prove much harder to agree. Fourth-pillar representatives want an escalator clause that ensures social welfare increases keep pace with rises in average incomes. They also want a review and monitoring procedure.
A breakthrough by the third pillar could restore momentum to the central negotiations on pay. Hard figures must emerge in the next few days if a breakdown in negotiations is to be averted.