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One in eight (12.1%) single-parent households were unable to afford regular leisure activities (e.g. swimming, playing an instrument, youth organisation membership) for their children. The comparable rate for two-parent households was 4.3%.
Over half (54.9%) of households with no working adult were unable to afford a one-week holiday for their children. This compares with one in four (26.0%) households with one working adult and one in ten (10.0%) households with two working adults.
One in twelve (8.5%) households with no working adults were unable to buy new clothes for their children, compared to 0.5% of households with two working adults.
One in three (33.2%) households in rented accommodation could not afford a one-week holiday for their children, four times higher than the rate for owner-occupied households (8.6%).
One in twenty (5.6%) households who rented were unable to afford new clothes for their children, compared with 0.6% of owner-occupied households.
One in six (17.1%) households without an Irish-born parent could not afford to pay for regular leisure activities for their children, compared with 2.1% of households with at least one Irish-born parent.
Overall, 5.7% of households without an Irish-born parent could not afford to invite friends of their children round to play or eat from time to time, compared with less than 1% of households with at least one Irish-born parent.
SILC is a household survey covering a broad range of topics relating to income and living conditions. It is the official source of data on household and individual income and provides key national poverty indicators, such as the at risk of poverty rate, the consistent poverty rate, and rates of enforced deprivation. This release is the fourth from the 2024 round of the survey.
Previous SILC releases include Survey on Income and Living Conditions Enforced Deprivation 2024, published 11 March 2025, income and poverty results in Survey on Income and Living Conditions 2024, published 20 March 2025 and Well-being - Survey on Income and Living Conditions 2024, published 25 March 2025.
Results published in today’s release relate to the responses of households with at least one child aged greater than zero and less than 16 at the end of the income reference period (31 December 2023). Typically, a parent of the child/children in the household provided this information.
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (08 May 2025) published the results from the Survey on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) 2024 module on Child Specific Deprivation. Households referred to in this release are those with at least one child aged greater than zero and less than 16 on 31 December 2023.
Commenting on today’s release, Lianora Bermingham, Statistician in the Income, Consumption and Wealth Division, said: “In SILC 2024, respondents in households with at least one child aged greater than zero and less than 16 on 31 December 2023 were asked to give information on 13 child-specific deprivation items such as households that could not afford new clothes, a one-week holiday, or pay for leisure activities for their children. Please see the Introduction Chapter which describes each of the 13 child-specific deprivation items in full. This data was collected as part of the three-yearly rolling module within the topic of ‘Children’ as directed by Eurostat. This is the second time the information in this module has been published, having previously been collected in SILC 2021, see SILC Module on Child Deprivation 2021.
Looking at the results, the deprivation rates for nine of the 13 child-specific deprivation items were lower in 2024 when compared with 2021. In percentage point terms, the largest decrease was in the percentage of households that were unable to afford new (not second-hand) clothes for their children, which fell from 4.8% in 2021 to 2.5% in 2024. The deprivation item with the largest percentage point increase was being unable to afford regular leisure activities for children which increased from 4.5% of households in 2021 to 5.9% in 2024.
In 2024, the deprivation rate for the 13 child-specific deprivation items ranged from 0.3% of households being unable to afford fruits and vegetables for their children once a day to 17.9% of households being unable to afford a one-week holiday for their children.
This report analyses how various household characteristics, such as family structure, employment status of adults, parents’ education level, housing tenure, and whether parents were born in Ireland affect child specific deprivation.
Overall, single-parent households, households with no Irish-born parent, households with no working adult, and rented households were more likely to experience deprivation across the 13 child-specific items.
Inability to Afford a One-Week Holiday
More than one in six (17.9%) households reported being unable to afford a one-week holiday for their children. When analysed by the number of parents in the household, one in three (33.2%) single-parent households could not afford a one-week holiday for their children, more than double the rate for two-parent households (14.1%).
Looking at the impact of household income on this rate shows that one in three (33.6%) households in the lowest income quintile (the 20% of households with the lowest income) could not afford a week’s holiday for their children compared with 2.6% of households in the top income quintile or the 20% of households with the highest income.
Inability to Afford Regular Leisure Activity
When parents were asked about their ability to afford a regular leisure activity for their children such as swimming or playing an instrument, 5.9% of households with children indicated that they could not afford to provide this item for their children.
Analysis by the number of working adults within the household shows that one in four (24.9%) households with no working adults were unable to afford regular leisure activities for their children, compared with 8.0% of households with one working adult and 2.7% of households with two working adults. A higher percentage of households without an Irish-born parent reported that they could not afford leisure activities for their children when compared with households with at least one Irish-born parent (17.1% compared with 2.1%).
Inability to Afford New Clothes
Parents were also asked about their ability to afford new (not second-hand) clothes for their children. In 2024, 2.5% of households with children indicated that they could not afford this item.
Looking at the impact of tenure status on this rate shows that households that were in rented accommodation were more likely to be deprived of new clothes when compared with owner-occupied households with children, 5.6% versus 0.6% respectively.
Inability to Afford to Invite Children’s Friends to Play or Eat
Overall, one in fifty (1.9%) of households with children reported that they were unable to invite friends of their children round to play or eat from time to time. Households with no working adult were more likely to be unable to afford this activity at 6.8% of such households, compared with 0.5% of households with two working adults.
Overall, 5.7% of households without an Irish-born parent could not afford to invite friends of their children round to play or eat from time to time compared with less than 1% of households with at least one Irish-born parent. Households that rented reported higher rates for this child-specific deprivation item at 4.2% compared with 0.5% of owner-occupied households with children.
Inability to Afford School Trips and School Events
In 2024, 1.8% of households with children reported that they could not afford school trips or school events that cost money. The rate for single-parent households was 10 times higher than the rate for two-parent households (6.2% and 0.6% respectively). Deprivation rates for this item were higher for households with no worker (6.7%) compared with households with two workers (0.5%). Households that rented and households with no Irish-born parent also reported higher levels of deprivation for this item.
Child Specific Material Deprivation
The Child Specific Material Deprivation Rate, as defined by Eurostat, is the percentage of children who are deprived of at least three out of 17 deprivation items, see Chapter on Child-Specific Material Deprivation Rate for full list of items.
In SILC 2024, 13.8% of children were identified as living in child-specific enforced deprivation. This figure increased from 12.6% in SILC 2021."