Poverty and housing crisis in the midst of lavish wealth

Figures on poverty released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on 12 December are almost unbelievable. They show that last year (2004) almost one fifth of the population (19.4 per cent) were at risk of poverty, by which they mean one fifth of the population were living on household incomes of €9,680 or less (that is, €186 per week or less).

The report stated: "Excluding social transfers (such as unemployment benefits, child benefits and pensions), the risk of poverty rate would have been close to 40 per cent (of the total population)".

The realisation that two in five people in this massively wealthy society are dependant on social welfare payments to keep them out of the "at-risk poverty" bracket is shocking.

The report, "EU Survey on Income and Living Conditions", stated: "Members of lone parent households and persons living alone were found to be among the most at risk in both years (2003 and 2004), with over 48 per cent (of lone parent households) and 36 per cent (of persons living alone) at risk of poverty in 2004.

The report went on to state: "When the risk of poverty is combined with an element of enforced deprivation, the survey shows that almost seven per cent of the population were 'consistently poor' in 2004, as compared to almost nine per cent in 2003".

The report states that, without social transfers, nearly all old people (87 per cent) would be at risk of poverty. The risk of poverty was higher for women than for men. The report notes a slight increase in the scale of inequality from one year to the next.

How was it that the first focus of the Budget presented on 7 December was not the scale of deprivation in Irish society? How is this not at the very top of the political agenda? How is the range of inequality not of central focus? What is it about our political system that an issue affecting at present a fifth of the population is not seen as a vote-getter, especially when 40 per cent of the population would be deprived were it not for social welfare payments? All the more so when 87 per cent of older people – those most likely to vote – would be in deprivation were it not for social welfare?

We have lost the plot politically. We no longer see issues of inequality and deprivation or potential deprivation as major issues. We are more concerned with cars, traffic, shopping and child-minding, than with the issues that affect so severely so many of our people.

As we report in this issue of Village, housing is another major issue, but another that is almost ignored (see page 18). According to a new survey ("Out of Reach: Inequalities in the Irish Housing System"), there are almost 106,000 households or 250,000 persons, in need of appropriate housing. The Government is making only token gestures in dealing with the issue and, in selling off public housing into the private sector, it is depleting the stock of houses to deal with the crisis. Indeed, the whole strategy of the Government on housing causes the massive housing prices boom, the only beneficiaries of which are speculators and property developers.

This is a hugely wealthy society now. Next year the projected combined income of everyone working here is in the region of €150,000,000,000, a per capita income of €36,000 (that is for every man, woman and child). It is a colossal amount. There is no social problem we could not solve with that income – deprivation, housing, health, education, whatever. And there would be lots to spare. Why is there an unwillingness to harness that huge income in the service of people most in need?

And, incidentally, how is it that the merest incremental improvements in welfare are greeted effusively by the likes of CORI, which, supposedly, was leading the battle for a fairer society – the lesson of Inchidoney 2004 is not that Bertie Ahern was converted to socialism, it is that Fr Sean Healy was co-opted into the political elite at the cost of a mere weekend away and some fleeting publicity.

Vincent Browne