I do not know whether the Tánaiste wants to answer this question. It is about whether he does the shopping in his house. Does he go to the grocery and fill his trolley with all the food that is required for the week? If he does, has he noticed how steeply the prices have risen for ordinary grocery products in the last year? They say there is no inflation in 2024, or at least that it has dropped severely but the price of basic foodstuffs is still rising. As of April 2024, the cost of potatoes increased by 17.3%, rice by 10.6%, olive oil by 23.5%, and frozen vegetables by 10.7%. That list of goodies really equals what a normal, average and low-paid household would include in its shopping, namely, the basic foodstuffs. There is no caviar or fresh crabmeat, just ordinary foodstuffs that families depend on. If the Tánaiste has not noticed, I certainly have, because every time I go shopping I look for the receipt to compare prices over a period. I know from talking to neighbours and people in my area that the cost of foodstuffs is crippling them.

The Barnardos survey that was published clearly backs that up. More than one in four parents did not have enough food to feed their children at some point in the last year. That is up from one in five in 2022. One in five say they are regularly unable to afford a main meal, a dinner, for their children and family. Almost half of parents said that they worry about having enough food for their children. What a disgraceful statistic in one of the richest countries in the world. Why is it happening? It is happening for a number of reasons. One is that when inflation in the past three years has been at 20% and still rising, in particular on foodstuffs, but incomes have not risen to that degree. Incomes are not even near it: they have increased by 7% on average, whether one is working or on social protection. That amounts to a real cut in income of 13% for ordinary households who spend more of their income, on average, on groceries than the likes of the Tánaiste and I do because we have a much higher income than them.

The other issue is profits, which are soaring. An ECB report said that profit margin increases contributed hugely to the cost-of-living increases. When we look at the operating profits of Tesco, for example, a shop well known for its inflated prices on ordinary groceries, they were €120 million plus for 2023. SuperValu saw an increase in turnover to €4.7 billion during 2022 and profit margins at Musgraves also increased. Then we have the banks. AIB had an exceptional profit margin of €2 billion. The ESB's profits rose to €868 million.

I thank the Deputy.

I cannot square that circle. I am against capitalism. I am an anti-capitalist. I am for a more egalitarian system. The Tánaiste is pro-capitalist. He eulogises it all the time.

Deputy Smith is way over time.

Can he please square that circle for me?

First, I do not eulogise capitalism. The Deputy says she is for a different system but she probably should be a bit more transparent. She believes in a 100% socialist economic model, which I do not think would have created the full employment that we have in this country today. I point to her approach to multinational companies. Yesterday, she said we should boycott Hewlett-Packard, and from the comments she made, by implication, Intel as well. There are thousands of people working in those companies in this country. They need to work to meet the cost of living and to provide for their families. I respectfully suggest, through the Chair, that the economic model the Deputy presents is one that would undermine the capacity of many families in this country to provide for their children and their families, because it would suck investment out of the country and would not enable us to have the reserves we have to distribute funding to those who most need it.

In our household, I do a bit of the shopping. I do not do the full shopping. I go once a week to the market. I get the porridge and the fruit. The costs have increased. By the way, my tastes are not everybody's tastes.

The costs have increased but through the budget we have worked very hard to try to deal with the cost of living because there was a big increase in inflation in the last two years. It started with the war in Ukraine and the rebound from Covid. That has hit people hard. Energy prices and food prices went up significantly. We are very conscious of that and that is why budget 2024 provided a €12 increase in weekly social welfare and pension rates. There were increased thresholds for the working family payment so that more families could qualify. Child benefit was extended to 18-year-olds in full-time education. A free book scheme was introduced for junior cycle students. We now have free book schemes for all primary kids and secondary students up to junior certificate. We hope to extend it. The hot school meals initiative as well has been very extensively expanded. The reduction in fees for school transport services has been extended for a further year. We introduced a reduction of €1,000 in fees and increased grants for third-level students. Fees were waived for students sitting State exams. The list goes on. There was a further reduction of 25% in childcare costs. More than half the population is now entitled to free GP care. We abolished hospital inpatient charges also, as well as other charges. We reduced the threshold in respect of the drug payments scheme. We brought in a rent tax credit. An unprecedented number of measures have been taken to try to ease the undoubted increase in costs that people have experienced. The Barnardos report does indicate that the SILC data of 2023 showed an overall decrease in consistent poverty from 4.9% in 2022 to 3.6% in 2023.

I thank the Tánaiste.

We need to do more.

I deliberately focused on the cost of groceries because my argument is that food inflation is crippling people. The Barnardos report shows that. Social Justice Ireland has shown that more than 500,000 people in this country are living in poverty, of which 180,000 are children. I am asking the Tánaiste what he is going to do about the rising cost of food. He can go shopping in some market and buy his porridge and fruit but most people rely on Tesco, Aldi and Lidl, where food inflation is still rising and there is no sign of it stopping.

We introduced a Bill to bring in price controls on both energy and food. The Bill will not see the light of day because of the ethos of the Government, which will not interfere with a market at a time when profits are going through the roof, poverty levels are increasing and the divide in society is increasing. The 1% at the top are getting much richer. For example, the earnings last year of the Irish CEO of Tesco, a man called Murphy, were 417 times that of the average Tesco worker at €1.9 million.

I thank the Deputy. I call on the Tánaiste to respond.

That is the sort of country we live in – one where parents let their kids go to bed hungry – and the sort of country that they face. What is the Tánaiste going to do about it to address that problem?

I call on the Tánaiste to respond.

First, the Deputy is not the only one who goes to the various shops she mentions. She should not create the impression that she is the only person in this House who goes to Tesco. I have been in Tesco. I have been in SuperValu.

He has been in Tesco.

I do not care where the Tánaiste was.

Through the Chair, the Deputy made a snide comment. She does not have a monopoly on these things. That is the only point I make. I go to a local market.

I mentioned local markets because I thought she agree that we should look after local producers.

The Tánaiste is being very defensive. Will he answer my question? No.

I have no problem buying eggs from the local person who produces them in Ballycotton. That is supporting local people in our communities who are doing an extra bit of work like that and keeping the local economy working as best we can.

I am sure that will be a great comfort to the parents of the kids who go hungry every day.

I have acknowledged the increase in food prices, as well as the cost of energy. That is why we did some unprecedented stuff in respect of giving people money back to try to deal with the undoubted increase in the cost of living. That is why the €400 lump-sum, once-off working family payments were made to 45,000 families with 97,000 children. A total of 409,000 households got a €300 fuel allowance lump sum. There was a lump-sum payment of €100 per child to families in respect of 370,000 qualified children. We gave a double child benefit payment for 1.2 million children.

We are over time.

The Deputy should acknowledge that.

I asked about food inflation.

Táimid ag bogadh ar aghaidh go dtí an chéad cheist eile.