John Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This meeting has been convened to consider the Revised Estimate for Vote 37 - Department of Social Protection, which was referred by the Dáil to the select committee with an instruction to report back to it. I welcome the Minister and his officials and than them for the briefing material provided which has been circulated to members. I also thank them for the constructive dialogue held with the committee secretariat's financial scrutiny team in developing its briefing document for the meeting. The committee has agreed to examine each programme area before broaching other questions. I refer to the briefing document prepared by the financial scrutiny team to guide our consideration of the Revised Estimate. We will start with pensions which are dealt with on page 7. I invite the Minister to make an opening statement.