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

We have two challenges here in the long term and the short term. The question is how you get to a long-term aim in the short term. What we are trying to do on this committee is to balance both. We will make a submission for the budget. The budget is finite. One of the challenges in the budget, if you are Minister for Social Protection, is that you are given a wad of money. Then you have the challenge. Do you raise basic rates or do you change the structure of schemes? Do you focus on a lot of changes across a whole lot of flaws, that have been rightly pointed out here, or do you pick one scheme and go for it? It is all very complex.

We made a recommendation the first year this committee came together to raise the income threshold for carer's allowance to €1,000 for a couple and €500 for a single person being assessed. The other issue we highlighted was the capital. If you had capital in the bank, the way it was calculated right across the system was quite bizarre. They were effectively charging you 20% once you reached a certain threshold. The Minister moved slightly on that. She raised the basic level that is disregarded from €20,000 to €50,000. That made a difference, particularly for a couple, because you can double the figures when you are doing the calculation. The income thresholds have gone from €375 to €450 and from €750 to €900. It has not reached where we were going and that was step one.

A number of points have been raised. I know what everyone wants is to abolish it. That is fine, but then we have to discuss disability allowance and lone-parent allowance and the means tests relating to them. Then there are groups who are in receipt of jobseeker's allowance, and right across the board. There are many things we have to try to cover with a finite amount of money. This is a challenge. The reason we are interested in this in both short term and long term is that if we make a budget submission to the effect that we want €2 billion and a €20 increase in every payment, the Minister is not going to get a blank cheque. As a result, she will disregard what we say. This is the mind game we have to play here. I want to put context on it. The Minister may just abolish the means test next autumn but just for a minute let us presume she does not. Then our choices are to just raise the thresholds, as the Minister has been doing, and reform the means-testing of capital further. I have been a long time proposing that we get the €4 rate and bring it down to €2. I do not like the system at all but most times here things are incremental. As I said, we wanted a higher rate. Obviously, inflation is eating into the rate of €1,000 we set initially. It was a bit more generous.

The third choice, which has been suggested in respect of carer's allowance, is more disregards of tax such as USC, which is not disregarded, and of, for example, mortgage payments. I am actually quite attracted to this proposal because it would help people who are in the situation of caring for younger people - a son or a daughter - over a long period. It helps them because they have housing costs that an older person who would be caring may not have. In many cases, they would own their own homes and if they did not they would obviously be helped in the same way. These are real world, not ideal world, choices but this is not an ideal world. Certainly, from where we are sitting, there are competing interests.

Jobseeker's benefit - although it is actually meant to be the jobseeker's allowance - is the one that has the X's and O's, as I call them, or, in other words, the three working days. The witnesses have rightly asked for reform in that regard. I wonder do they, particularly in the rural communities, come across another syndrome. This is where you would have a couple, one of whom is in receipt of a payment such as farm assist, jobseeker's allowance, disability allowance or whatever. Then the partner wants to go working. The first €60 is disregarded. After that, 60% is taken. The richest person in the country does not pay tax at a rate of 60%. As stated, 60% is taken off the payment and then you hit a wall. Is that an issue in the context of recruiting carers? As I said, it seems to be more of a rural than an urban issue in my constituency, and my constituency is 50-50. I will explain what happens in those cases where you have somebody on farm assist. How the means test relating a couple is carried out is that all the means are taken into account. However, if the partner is working, they disregard €20 for three days a week, which is €60, and then they take 60% of the balance as means.

That is punitive. As I work on an incremental basis - I know where I am going and that I will not get them to jump - I have proposed for a number of budgets a €100 disregard and 50% of the balance. That is not because I think that is fair, but it might be achievable. It is necessary to dangle something we might be able to get. I would be interested in that and specifically in the carer's allowance. I know what the witnesses want, but I ask them to allow for the fact that we will not get there in one go. As a member of the committee, I am interested in where the priorities lie to get to where we want to go if we are going there in incremental steps. As I said, if some Minister comes in and suddenly finds a pot of gold to give them everything they want, I will not complain.