Increases in social welfare payments and child benefits are among Combat Poverty's Budget proposals, released yesterday.
The organisation wants tax and welfare payments to be indexed to earnings rather than inflation, and a minimum increase in social welfare payments of £8 per week. It also recommends "an equitable system of support" for the childcare costs of low-income families.
The agency's director, Mr Hugh Frazer, said better-off households gained up to four times more than poorer households in last year's Budget. "We cannot allow this to happen again in a country where the poorest fifth of households accounts for 5 per cent of total income and the most affluent 20 per cent have 44 per cent or nine times more," he said.
Mr Frazer said the agency's proposals would redress this imbalance and ensure the Budget narrowed the gap between the rich and the poor.
With an expected Exchequer surplus of £2 billion, the issue is not one of affordability but of how we choose to allocate the additional resources, he added.
The agency's proposals would cost £1.46 billion, divided equally between tax and welfare expenditure.
They include:
An increase in lowest social welfare payments of £8 per week and of £15.60 for a couple on short-term unemployment assistance.
An £800 increase in the personal allowance and £200 increase in the PAYE allowance.
An extension of the tax band for single people by £3,000.
An increase in weekly child dependant allowances to £16 for under-12-year-olds and to £19 for children over 12.
An increase in child benefit by between £3 and £4 per week to £13 and £17 per week.
The introduction of a £10 per week child benefit supplement for children under five, or a weekly parental payment of £20 for families with a child under five.
Mr Frazer said Ireland is more unequal and has higher poverty levels than comparable countries. "This suggests that our poor performance on issues such as child poverty is primarily of our own making, arising from the concentrated nature of unemployment and limited redistributionary effects of tax and welfare policies. We are advising that Budget 2001 reverses this pattern of inequality and income poverty."