Mr. Tim Duggan:

The first question was about being troublesome and turning up at the post office without a card and needing a payment. It is not mandatory for a social welfare customer receiving payment at a post office to present a public services card but we would prefer that people presented them to access their payment. If they do not use the public services card, or if they do not yet have one – we have customers who do not yet have one because we are in a roll-out programme and we have not reached everybody yet - we have a protocol with An Post whereby a person presents his or her social services card and some form of photographic ID.

There is a protocol for dealing with that. The alternative to that is that the post office personnel are able to testify to the identity of the person through familiarity and knowing them for years but we want them to have the social services card because that is their record on the system for An Post personnel to pay them.

As for what it stops one from accessing if one does not have a social services card, the whole point is not the card but one's identity being verified to a substantial level of assurance. The card proves that. What public bodies do, including my own, is say that in shorthand, which is that one needs a card for this, but what they really mean is that one needs one's identity verified to a substantial level of assurance and the way one proves that is by presenting one's card. It is the easiest way to do that. Otherwise, both the person in question and us must go to a lot of trouble to make sure the person's identity is verified to a substantial level of assurance.

I said we have processes for doing that. Other organisations have different views and use their regulations where they can specify precisely the documentation they require to provide their services. Some have said they want the public services card because it is the best and only way they are willing to accept that someone's identity is verified to a substantial level of assurance. It is possible, therefore, that in those instances a person may not be able to access those services.

We have set out in the comprehensive guide, which I can read for members if-----