Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 5:

In page 11, between lines 24 and 25, to insert the following: “Report on means-testing for Blind Pension and Disability Allowance

21. The Minister shall prepare and lay a report before the Houses of the Oireachtas on the means-testing eligibility requirement for Blind Pension and Disability Allowance and the impact that income threshold limitations have on access to these schemes and that the report shall be presented to the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Social Protection within 9 months of the enactment of this Act.”.

This is related to what Deputy Ó Cuív said regarding means testing. There is scope for some modernisation in terms of means testing. I know the Government has committed to reviewing means testing of payments, but we do not have information on that yet. Social assistance payments are available to those who do not have enough PRSI contributions to qualify for social insurance payments. For example, someone who becomes unemployed but fails to qualify for jobseeker's benefit can apply for jobseeker's allowance instead. However, the entire household income is considered a means so it can be difficult to qualify for the full rate of €220. Sometimes, much of the money in a house can be going to one as opposed to the other.

Even at the highest rate of payment, it does not take into account the varying costs experienced by households in our society. The concentration of income inadequacy is in part due to the current structure of our social welfare system. Existing rates do not adequately support the MESL we discussed earlier. The existing system can underestimate that. We can see that exemplified, in particular, when the rate of means-tested welfare payments is being calculated for households with children that are headed by one adult. This can mean that the current system for determining social assistance is flawed on a comprehensive model to ensure social welfare supports for Ireland are fit for purpose. It relates a little bit to the previous point. In particular regarding these payments, the cost of disability should be borne in mind with regard to applying for the pension and disability allowance.

I will make two further points regarding two cases I came across recently. One involved somebody who was put over the limit very marginally by the fact that this person's adult children were paying a contribution. The children were back living with the parents and making a contribution to the running of the house, and that was treated as means. I am not sure how that would be put in legislation.I refer to people handing up money in the traditional sort of way. It is difficult. It was a family in which everyone was doing their best and trying to be fair and decent to each other, but it ended up with a reduction in the carer's allowance that was being provided. The other case is similar whereby somebody had gone over the threshold but will now be under the new threshold. I raised this with the Minister previously and asked whether it can be done operationally. Obviously, the Department needs to be careful in the circumstances in which it does this. We had the ability prior to child maintenance legislation to be able to not disqualify people who were applying on the basis of that part of their income assessment. Similarly, would it be possible operationally for people who are being reviewed at the minute and who fall between the old and new thresholds not to have their payments reduced during the course of the next six or seven months until the next increase in the disability payment?