Anti-poverty plan - Action must be taken on election vows

DESPITE the unprecedented wealth of the Celtic Tiger phenomenon — now a dim and distant memory as industry declines and thousands of jobs are lost — the stark reality is that poverty remains a dark blot on the conscience of society.

In the run-up to the General Election, the political parties are busy wooing voters with a bewildering array of auction politics, likely to be dishonoured later. Hopefully, the Coalition’s anti-poverty plan, embedded in the National Action Plan for Social Inclusion 2007-2016, is not in that category.

Not surprisingly, this blueprint, which set out a 10-year target for eradicating ‘consistent poverty’, was strongly criticised by the Conference of Religious of Ireland (CORI) for ignoring the thousands of “working poor” at risk of hardship and deprivation.

In a wave of fresh criticism, the European Anti Poverty Network (EAPN) Ireland, has accused the Government of leaving behind hundreds of thousands of people over the last decade.

Its blunt message, delivered at yesterday’s session of the Oireachtas Committee on Social and Family Affairs, was that in a time of unprecedented wealth, Ireland is in grave danger of squandering the opportunity to eliminate poverty. In a barrage of stinging criticism from EAPN, the plan was described as “a catalogue of missed targets and missed opportunities”.

Politicians can’t dismiss the representatives of EAPN Ireland as belonging to the bleeding heart syndrome. The alliance is made up of people working at the coalface of the poverty crisis. They include the Simon Communities, One Family and the Irish National Organisation for the Unemployed (INOU).

According to Robin Hanan of EAPN, while the last three budgets have contained redistributative elements, overall the target to eliminate consistent poverty has been abandoned. He claims the measures are inadequate to address the 140,000 working poor, or the continued social exclusion of Travellers, lone parents, people with disabilities, older people and ethnic minorities.

One Family, the organisation working with lone parents, is highly critical of the targets aimed at reducing the high levels of poverty among one-parent families and cutting child poverty.

With some reason, the INOU is worried about the increase in the number of long-term unemployed, which has risen by 4,000 over the past five years.

According to the Simon Communities, the Government’s plan lacks ambition when it comes to the difficulties facing the homeless.

Fighting for the forgotten people on the margins of society, Simon activists believe the strategy could have been far more ambitious in terms of addressing the needs of people at risk of homelessness and those using homeless services.

While poverty is gradually abating, it is still far too prevalent. According to statistics compiled by Cori, in 2007 the poverty line for a single person is €209.87 a week, or €10,951 a year. For a household of four it is €486.90 a week or €25,406 a year.

Given that almost 25% of those at risk live in households headed by someone who has a job, Cori regards the failure to set out effective initiatives, targets and time frames to address this group’s poverty as unacceptable.

With an election looming, strategies and plans are now the stuff of political promises. In the final analysis, however, the resourcing and implementation of those plans and strategies are what really count.

Those on the margins are hoping, as one delegate put it yesterday, that the political will is there to drive the strategy and deliver on the targets.