Marie Louise O'Donnell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I remember when I came to the Seanad four years ago, one of the big issues with social welfare was that with all of the new areas - with the complexities of what one is entitled to, and under the complex circumstances of people’s fragile lives - there was going to be some kind of parallel communications strategy to reflect the complexity of the change.

I agree with the Chairman that social media should be used more. It happens that even in the advertising of simple information we think we are communicating but we are really not, and that is why people are falling between stools. Communications plays an enormous part and the use of social media by our Intreo offices is important. There has been an incredible amount of work done through the Intreo offices and services to try to get people back to their sense of self and a sense of worth. It is always the communication that falls down – there is a presumption that it is happening when it is not. I am presuming that this may be one of the outcomes of the INOU report, which will be very interesting. It is not as though the Department does not want to see things happening, but we do not communicate very simply, informatively or imaginatively to those people who most need it because there is a presumption that they know what is happening, although they may not.