Willie Penrose (Westmeath, Labour)

I thank the Minister for his reply and acknowledge that he has increased the capital disregards, which is very welcome. The Minister referred to the value of the home being disregarded for social welfare schemes. This is not strictly the case when applied to carers. I am aware of a carer who owns a house but who moved into her 95 year old father's home to care for him. She earns a rental income of €120 a week from her home which she has declared. Her father required full-time care and attention and she needed to stay with him in his house which is seven miles from her house.

As a result of the manner in which capital assessment is computed under the relevant legislation, the Minister's officials were forced to take into account the capital value of her house in which she was unable to live because she was providing full-time care for her elderly father. The departmental officials would not take into account the income arising from the rental value of the house. The Minister is an accountant and will be aware that the rental value of the house is the actual as opposed to the imputed value arising in capital.

Is it not time to change that rule? That calculation deprived the lady, herself in her late 40s, of the carer's allowance. Is this not grossly unfair? She was saving the State approximately €600 a week, was seeking a carer's allowance of approximately €150 a week but lost out. Bureaucratic capital evaluation bears no relationship to the actual income deriving from the house. Although it was let to an auctioneer, it was still regarded as the woman's income.

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