Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Thursday, 7 November 2019
Public Accounts Committee
2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 37 - Employment Affairs and Social Protection
Chapter 12 - Regularity of Social Welfare Payments
Chapter 13 - Timeliness of Income Support Claim Processing
Chapter 14 - Customer Service - Development of Income Support Application Forms
9:00 am
Shane Cassells (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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That is the issue. People sees the form and do not go through it. They then come into our offices. Mr. McKeon mentioned online forms. The size of the forms is one issue. How somebody applies is, obviously, totally different. In an era when one can do almost everything online, figure 14.2 in the report shows how out of the 19 main schemes offered by the Department, only five can be offered online. These are jobseeker's allowance and benefit, child benefit, the back to school allowance and maternity benefit. Payments like disability benefit, carer's payments, rent supplement and State pensions are not offered online. What is the Department doing to try to roll out more online applications? What is prohibiting the Department from doing so? Which of the main payments that are not offered online will come online? Will any of them come online in 2020?