Cavan-Monaghan Citizen's Information manager, Cecilia Smith, said this year's budget was one for children, pensioners, families and those on social welfare payments. Cecilia was invited to give her views on Budget 2025 during a Northern Sound panel discussion. She said it is a budget to tackle cost of living pressures with "child poverty a continuous theme".
While the manager from Cavan welcomed a range of supports including book schemes, lunches and "hungry holidays" meals for school-age children, Cecilia Smith said, the government has fallen short in other areas.
A pre-budget report by Social Justice Ireland recommended a €25 increase in social welfare payments to raise the standard of living for many but, the Finance Minister announced less than half of that: "Child poverty seems to be a continuous theme in our budgets," Cecilia said during the panel discussion, We've been looking at a report from Social Justice Ireland, a pre-budget report that they had issued and they talked about how there'd need to be a 27.3 per cent increase in minimum wage and social welfare payments in order to bring people to reasonable standard of living but, they haven't quite hot that because that would've resulted in a a €25 social welfare payment increase so we see a €12 increase so we're still a bit away from that target."
