The challenge facing the next Government will be to bring the State's social services up to an EU-average level, the Conference of Religious of Ireland (CORI) said today.
CORI's Justice Commission said Ireland continues to display serious deficits in its social infrastructure and social provision.
In a pre-Election submission published today, CORI Justice said it had identified 16 issues that needed to be addressed to create a more equitable society.
In terms of social services, Ireland's spending stands out as being well below the EU average, the group claimed and this was causing high levels of poverty and exclusion.
It said that reducing Ireland poverty level to the EU average would require the benchmarking of social welfare payments to average industrial earnings.
It also advocated providing equity of social welfare rates across genders; enhance the early childhood supplement; support carers; and provide higher state pensions and cost of disability payments.
CORI Justice suggests the allocation of further resources for social services should not be attained through income taxation, "but rather via reforming and broadening the tax base so that Ireland's taxation system becomes fairer".
"We stand at a crossroads. Ireland needs a government committed to an agenda for fair and sustainable progress. The choice is ours," CORI said.