Mr. John McKeon:

I will ask Brian to come in if I may. On a general point the Senator is correct. As I said earlier to Deputy Collins, the number of appeals hearings that are dealt with through oral hearings has reduced significantly. That is a concern for both the chief appeals officer and the Department. We must keep an eye on it. It is not necessarily always a bad thing. The speed with which appeals are turned around now is much quicker as a consequence of many appeals being dealt with on a summary basis. It has gone from an average of approximately 25 or 26 weeks to approximately 15 weeks. We must be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We have all learned from the Covid-19 pandemic. Things that were done previously in person can now be done through correspondence or online. We need to keep the benefits of that without damaging the genuine cases. We must get the balance right. If the Senator asked me whether the balance was right, I would have similar questions to the ones he has. The Department does not have any malign intent. We are probably going through an adjustment period. We need to look at what the consequences are. Overall, the proportion of successful appeals is broadly in the same ballpark as previously. It is 55% now versus 60% prior to the pandemic. There is a drop. We are conscious of that and we need to be careful. We are paying attention to it. Mr. Molloy can confirm that no direction has been given to appeals officers not to hold oral hearings. They are entitled, however, to make a decision as to whether an oral hearing is necessary. As I said, we are changing the regulations to make it absolute that people have a right to an oral hearing or to be given a reason if it is not granted.