Ms Clare Duffy:

It is always nice to be on the same page as Deputy Ó Cuív. I want to acknowledge all of his points. As he said, everything that he has in his paper, I have in mine, so that is good.

The big frustration with regard to the IQA is that there is an anomaly. Even though people are getting a contributory State pension, which is not means tested, the IQA is. The other thing that is incredibly frustrating is that it is based on the assets. In my experience, it is having assets that causes someone not to satisfy the means test for the IQA.

Very often it is farming families. It is the fact that people have the land that often pushes the wife out of eligibility. It is the assets as opposed to the income that concerns me.

Deputy Ó Cuív referred to inheritance and how getting a lump sum affects pension entitlements and the children in the family, in particular where there are significant care needs. There was a very welcome announcement in last month's budget. I thank the committee for its work in highlighting the issue through its submission. The budget increased from €20,000 to €50,000 the capital disregard for carer's allowance. I have done the calculations for families and this will make a major difference to some families who have a few bob in the bank. If the disregard could equally apply to the non-contributory State pension, it would make an enormous difference.

In terms of the distinction between long-term carers and carers who care for a shorter period, I am satisfied that the current safety nets – the homemaker's scheme and the home caring periods – are sufficient to protect shorter term carers, for example, people who are caring for their mum or dad for two or three years. The cohort we must support is what the commission calls long-term carers – I call them lifetime carers – because they have dedicated their life to caring.

One point I have not mentioned, which is important, is awareness about pension entitlement. It was one of the recommendations that we made to the commission and it has been reflected in the report. At the moment, people only get a PRSI statement if they take the time to log on and request one. Once they get it, they would need to have a PhD to interpret it and understand what it means. We have called for a more regular PRSI statement that would be automatically sent to people, perhaps when they reach the age of 50 and again at 55, so that if there are gaps, they can plug them and do something about them. The PRSI statement should not be sent in its current format but should be interpreted a little more. I appreciate that would require resources.

The Chairman mentioned the manual aspect of caregiving. We have done countless reports in Family Carers Ireland which show the enormous physical, mental and psychological impact of caregiving. I do not know the statistics off the top of my head, but we have figures that show the physical impact of caregiving, which is enormous. I do not mean it in a disrespectful way, but carers do not have the luxury of retiring. As long as their caring responsibilities continue, it does not matter if they are 66, 68 or 69, they still will provide that care, very often until their body simply gives up. It is a highly manual, physical task. Retirement ages do not count in the sector I work in.