Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Can I ask a couple of questions? As soon as the Minister sits down in the House, I will have to go, so I might have to look at the Official Report later for the responses. First, Dr. Griffin mentioned this debate between right and left. As we know there is a toxic atmosphere beginning to emerge in this country, particularly on the extreme right. One of the points they would raise regarding a system of universal payments, however, is that it would act as a pull factor for people from the common travel area or the European Union to come to Ireland. Perhaps some of the contributors could comment on that. The pandemic unemployment payment has shown that this is not a black-and-white scenario and there are additional benefits to the economy that have not been contemplated up to now. I suggest that Dr. Griffin's submission in particular could be usefully explored when we meet the Department about the Estimates process and the public service performance report. We could bring up a lot of these issues during that meeting.

I was interested in one comment made, and our witnesses can all respond to this, which was that the Irish Department of Social Protection is something of a black box for all Irish researchers. How would you all like to see that changed in practice, because this is something on which the committee could make a recommendation to the Department? I know that in principle, it would be willing to engage along those lines. I also ask Dr. Dukelow to comment on her graph on the increase in expenditure in illness, disability and caring. This seems to be a trend in the UK as well. Have you any idea why this trend is going up and have you any indication of change in this regard as a result of the fallout from the Covid pandemic? I refer in particular to issues like long Covid. You may not be able to make a comment on it but if you could, that would be interesting.

The committee can take up this issue but in the last sentence of your submission, you made the point that maintenance, even if not paid, will still be assessed as secondary benefits for housing payments and medical cards. As a committee, having been taken through this legislation on maintenance payments, we will write directly to both the housing Minister and the Minister for Health to ask that both of those maintenance calculations be taken out of those assessments in light of the passage of the social welfare legislation. I have two further comments specifically for Dr. Boland. We are talking again about spousal income and the income disregards. Would it be better to transition this away from the welfare end of it and deal with it solely through the existing taxation code, rather than trying to deal with it twice?

Finally, the witnesses have given us a lot of food for thought on the impact of the social security system in the UK on partnership dissolution. It would be interesting if there is any evidence whatsoever in that regard here in this country. I apologise, as I have to rush into the Dáil Chamber now. The Leas-Chathaoirleach will take the chair.