Shane Cassells (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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I will move on to chapter 13 - timeliness of income support claim processing. When the Department appeared before us last year, it had examined this area. Following on from that, there was a finding and recommendation in our March periodic report, which read:

The processing of applications by the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection requiring medical assessments is unduly slow. The Committee recommends that the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection completes its examination of the possibility of contracting nurses to carry out medical assessments promptly. Should it not be viable, other alternatives should be actioned to improve processing times.

Mr. McKeon alluded to this issue in his opening statement when speaking about carer's allowance and so forth. Are there further updates?