Marie Moloney (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I shall commence by saying the nice things first. I thank the delegation for attending. I compliment the staff who work in the appeals office. Whenever we ring them they are always informative, courteous, return our calls and inform us what is happening.

They are the nice remarks.

The witness referred to the waiting and processing times. Unfortunately, the reality on the ground does not reflect those times. I dealt recently with an appeal for a carer who was waiting two and a half years for a decision on her carer's allowance. That is certainly not reflected in these figures. The average processing time for the invalidity pension is 48.7 weeks. That is nearly a year. It is very hard to tell somebody that their claim is being dealt with when they are waiting a year for a decision on the application. It is just not good enough for the people concerned. We can bandy figures around here and dress them up to look as attractive as we wish, but the fact is that a person must wait a year for a decision on an invalidity pension.

The witness also referred to the supplementary welfare appeals. I am encountering many problems for people who are living on supplementary welfare allowance while waiting for appeals for invalidity, disability or other social welfare benefits. That allowance is not recognised as a payment for things such as third level grants. People cannot get the third level grant because they are on supplementary welfare. It is not recognised as a payment. We must sharpen up and sort things out for these people. Their children are waiting for a payment to go to college, while they are living on supplementary welfare allowance. Again, it is not good enough.

With regard to the oral hearings, according to the figures 53% of people who have oral hearings get a favourable result, as opposed to a rate of 30.6% for people who do not have an oral hearing. Obviously, the oral hearing is the way to go. I know, from dealing with this, that there is great compassion and fairness among the appeals officers, which one does not get from a written report. They listen to the people's stories about what life is like for them. It is a little like how we are listening to the survivors of the Magdalen laundries. On a piece of paper it does not cut ice in the same way. The witness answered the question about waiting for the files from the Department, but, to be honest, it is a disgrace. Once a decision has issued on illness benefit or whatever, the Department is finished with the file and should give it to the appeals office. What is the waiting for? What more work does the Department have to do with it?

I took the time to meet the chief medical officer in the Department of Social Protection to discuss the delays in the medical based schemes. Since that meeting, things have improved dramatically for me. I understand the system better and can guide my constituents. However, they are the people who come to see me. What about the people who do not? I had four cases and instead of going to the appeals office I sought a review. All four cases were successful. The chief medical officer is now using those four cases for training purposes within the Department to show the type of people who should not have slipped through the net.

Can the witness recommend to the Department, with regard to the medical based schemes, that a more detailed medical history be sought on the application forms? That is where all the medical based applications are failing. They do not provide for a sufficiently detailed report, and when a detailed letter is later sent from a doctor or consultant the Department changes its mind. If the medical report was more detailed in the first instance, the Department could avoid many appeals. Can the appeals office make that recommendation? We have certainly made it, but the Department is obviously not listening. In addition, the applicants' general practitioners, GPs, are getting fed up with having to issue letters every day for the Department of Social Protection. They are beginning to brush people off saying they have already provided a letter and report when people seek a more detailed report. A girl rang me today about her appeal. She has been waiting for two years and has approximately 12 letters from doctors, four from the same GP who is getting absolutely fed up of the whole business. That is the reality on the ground.

There is another matter. When a medical based application is turned down by the Department on a medical ground and an applicant appeals the decision, the Department does not carry out the means testing part of the application. An applicant who goes through an appeal on medical grounds and is successful will think: "That is great. My disability or carer's allowance has been approved." However, they then discover the means testing has not been carried out. That might mean the application will be turned down again and might necessitate another appeal on the same application. The Department should carry out more tasks in tandem. It should carry out the means test along with assessing the medical section.

Perhaps the witness will address those issues.