Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcomed the increase last year in the capital disregard for carers. I also welcomed the fuel allowance this year. As the Minister is aware, the capital disregard for the allowance for carers is causing havoc in the whole system of assessing capital. I have raised a number of these issues with the Minister previously. For example, consider the situation of the disability allowance. I will grant that it is €50,000, if I am correct, but the problem is the €4 per €1,000 in all of these schemes, once the person gets €20,000 above the threshold. That is 20% interest and it penalises people who are thrifty. In the case of the disability allowance, it also penalises people who have inherited money from their parents, or where parents have very carefully put aside a small pension policy or put aside capital to give to the person. Time and again I have highlighted this issue with the Minister. A very disabled person will never ever have a chance of working as maybe he or she cannot walk or talk. When the parents die, which is in the normal course of the life cycle, they will leave their worldly goods to their three children, for example. Perhaps it will amount to a modest €600,000 if a house is taken into account and so on. The two children who are able-bodied are working and will have €200,000 apiece. They would pay no death duties because the inheritances are under the limit. However, the person who is born with a severe disability will get the €200,000 but suddenly finds that the disability allowance has disappeared and has gone. It has gone with the wind. In all justice, this issue needs to be tackled radically, and not touched at the fringes.

I have also mentioned another issue to the Minister. This is where a lack of knowledge of the system comes into play. Many such families are now coming to pension age. Consider the single income family, where one of the couple worked, which is very common, and the other spouse worked maybe even harder still to rear the family. This other spouse reared the family and made a home and was maybe involved in a lot of the committees in the community. These are all of the things that people should do. In that situation what happens? If they are knowledgeable of the social welfare system, they will do the wrong thing, in my view, which is to keep the money and any savings that thrifty people have in the primary earner's bank account, and they will not share it. However, if they are very thrifty and if they have a good job and they share it in a joint bank account, or worse still if they put it into the non-working spouse's bank account, which is totally counter-sensible and runs against everything we say about those situations and what people should do, then what happens when they come to the criteria for the increase for a qualified adult? They will find that if they have €150,000 imputed to the spouse or the partner in the one income situation, that will be imputed as an income of €470 per week.

Suddenly, that person does not get the increase for a qualified adult, whereas a person who either knew the system or was a scrounger or selfish and put it in his or her bank account would find that the increase was intact. I had hoped we would see radical reform and simple changes this year. It does not take a commission or rocket science to make some of these changes.

I suggested, as did the committee, that we should increase the threshold to €50,000. Let us change it for all schemes to €50,000, which would not cost that much, and impute no more than €2 per €1,000 on the higher end of the savings. Now, €2 per €1,000 is still an equivalent of 10% interest. I do not know of any high street bank that is paying 10% interest. I do not know anywhere that people could invest and be guaranteed 10% unless they are property moguls or something. These people are not like that.

The Minister might say that €150,000 is a lot of savings but it is worth remembering that somebody might get a lump sum on leaving employment. Supposing somebody has risen to a middle rank in the Civil Service and left with a lump sum, which he or she puts it into a joint bank account. People may have other savings through their lives if they have been working for 40 years. We would hope they would have savings and people can be very careful. However, they are being penalised for being careful and being good citizens.

I ask the Minister to at least look at giving us a costing for this. I reckon the reason I never get a costing is that it would not cost anything substantial. This is catching and tripping up people who are vulnerable, albeit not in massive numbers, in a very unfair way. Would it be possible to at least get a costing? The Minister might consider providing for this in a Social Welfare Bill, although it is too late to do it in this Bill. Would it be possible to give us a speedy costing as to what would happen if all of the basic thresholds were raised to provided for a €50,000 disregard? A rate of €1 per €1,000 would then apply to the next €10,000 and for all the remaining thousands, it would be set at €2 per €1,000. Will she give us a costing across all schemes if that minor adjustment was made? What would it be?

This is worth noting when we talk about these costings. It is something I am sure the Minister is totally mesmerised by between trying to deal with a budget of €400 million in one Department and €24 billion in another. When we talk about costings in social welfare, what looks big in one Department is not big in another. The Minister blithely told us we did really well because we are only €700 million over budget. Is that figure correct? I also had a culture shock when I was in that Department when I found that €20 million here and €10 million there was very small money. Unforeseen factors could have a much bigger effect, such as welfare going up or down. When I say "welfare", I mean the number of those out of work going up or down would have a much bigger effect. Will the Minister come back with the costing? Will she consider making that simple change in the spring?

A couple in a house may have somebody living with them who is, say, on carer's allowance. That is fair enough if that person is only on carer's allowance, but he or she might also be working up to 18.5 hours per week. Is the threshold €1,000 above the basic social welfare, including the basic carer's allowance, for the couple? The arrangement I described is a very common one nowadays and it keeps people in their own homes. If it is a single person with a carer living in the house who, again, might be working, is the threshold €500? How will this work? We could trip up people in a caring situation here. Rather than putting people into nursing homes, we should be facilitating carers in every way we can in the system because caring at home, where possible, is better, although there are many circumstances in which it is not possible. Surely we learned this from the pandemic that the first choice has to be that the person is cared for at home.

I will very briefly ask the Minister a question about the partial capacity benefit, which is for those who are self-employed and employed. A person can only get this benefit if he or she has a moderate or severe or profound disability, which is measured at 50%, 75% and 100%. Many of these people can only work intermittently because sometimes they are well and sometimes they are not. Furthermore, I know of a particular case, which is fantastic and typical of what is possible, of somebody with quite advanced multiple sclerosis who was able to do translation from home on a self-employed basis. In some weeks and months, this person made some money, which is not badly paid when it can be done properly. However, there were many weeks and months in which no money was earned.

There are not many people on the partial capacity benefit because the threshold is relatively high. How much would it cost to give people the disability benefit? By definition, their disability must be moderate, severe or profound. Not all the people on invalidity payments are eligible for the partial capacity benefit. People who have mild or very limited disabilities do not get the partial capacity benefit. Can the Minister tell us the number of people on partial capacity benefit? What would it cost to be that little bit more generous? I often find that the system can be penny-pinching. When we add up the sums, the cost would be immaterial. I bet even the cost of paying this extra disability payment would be a tiny fraction of it. This decision should be amended and the payment should be made.