Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)

I must deal with the law as it is. The recipients were told that from the start of the next season the error would not be continued. I suppose there are a number of ways out of it. We cannot continue to pay all 237 people without paying the 4,000 other people. We cannot tell the 237 people in question that they can keep the allowance because they got it in error, but the people down the corridor will not get the allowance because they have never been in receipt of it. Deputy Gregory knows as well as I do that we could not do that. It has been suggested that we pay the allowance to all 4,000 people and amend the regulations accordingly. That is an expensive proposition that will be considered in a budgetary context.

I regret that 237 people in various local authority complexes have to endure this change. I have instructed my officials to contact the people in question and to give them every possible support. It is not open to me to restore the fuel allowance to the 237 people without offering the scheme across the board. I take the Deputy's point that such an explanation is not of much assistance to the 237 people who were getting the allowance for a long time before it was suddenly withdrawn from them. I will examine the matter again to see how it can be sorted out. While I do not want the 237 people in question to suffer, I must take cognisance of the fact that they erroneously received an allowance to which they were not legally entitled. They were protected against increases in fuel prices in any case because fuel was being supplied to them. I have outlined the current circumstances. I invite Deputy Gregory to suggest a neater solution than the extension of the fuel allowance scheme to people who are in receipt of fuel. As that does not seem like a sensible route, I would like to be convinced of a better route. I am not in the business of annoying 237 individuals who find it hard enough to live without such interference. I will do what I can to be of assistance to them. I have listened to Deputy Gregory's comments and I will examine the matter.

It is worth taking a broader view of this legislation, which is the first social welfare consolidation measure since 1993. I am glad the House is giving this Bill, which contains nothing new, a speedy passage. I thank the officials in the Department of Social and Family Affairs who worked so hard on this fearsomely difficult and tedious consolidation process. I have seen the blood, sweat and tears of the experts who have advised us as part of this awesome task. The House should acknowledge that this legislation will consolidate in a single Act all the changes made to the social welfare code since 1993. The consolidated legislation will be very useful for Deputies and customers alike.

According to the Central Statistics Office, over the last decade inflation has run at approximately 32%, gross industrial earnings have grown by 68% and social welfare rates have increased by almost 82%. Every effort has been made to ensure that social welfare rates have stayed well ahead of inflation and the increases in gross industrial earnings. It is obvious that we have a distance to travel in that regard. The thresholds used in the risk of poverty indicator have increased by approximately 140%. A fair effort has been made to increase social welfare rates.

A number of Deputies, including Deputy Paul McGrath, expressed strong feelings about the child dependant allowance. As I have said previously, the Government continues to pursue a deliberate policy of concentrating on child benefit, rather than tackling the child dependant allowance. I listen carefully to the views of groups like the Combat Poverty Agency, which recently made a presentation to me on the matter. There is a growing view that I should re-examine the child dependant allowance in the context of tacking child poverty, to which we are all committed. I will certainly do that. Deputies are aware that I am committed to trying to bring together the child dependant allowance and the family income supplement to create a new second-tier child benefit allowance, aimed at the bottom 10% or 20% of low-income families, after I have received the final report of the National Economic and Social Forum on the matter. If we can bring the allowance and the supplement together, as we are trying to do every day, there might then be a case for a re-evaluation of the Government's policy on child dependant allowance, as an interim measure. Such a change will only be made in the context of the creation of a new second-tier allowance.

Deputy Ring asked about the inclusion of mobile telephones under the free schemes. His assertion about the telephone allowance was broadly correct. I am anxious that those who are entitled to the allowance should be allowed to claim it in respect of mobile telephones or land lines, depending on which they prefer. I do not intend at this stage to allow people to acquire mobile telephones in addition to land lines under the scheme. I am satisfied that it is appropriate to allow the fixed-rate allowance that is available at present to be used in either case. We have been making some progress in this regard.

Deputy Durkan was anxious to emphasise the importance of carers. He will be aware that the long-term care working group, chaired by officials from the Department of the Taoiseach and involving officials from other Departments, particularly the Department of Health and Children, was established on foot of the Mercer report. Significant improvements have been made to the carer's allowance and, particularly, the carer's benefit schemes. The Deputy asked me to consider the recommendation of the Joint Committee on Social and Family Affairs that carer's allowance be paid in conjunction with widow's or widower's pension. The cost of paying the carer's allowance at half-rate in conjunction with another social welfare payment would be approximately €30 million, which is a significant amount of money. The principle followed at present is that one should receive just one payment from the Department of Social and Family Affairs. I would be reluctant to enter into unknown territory by compounding a primary payment by making a second payment. Deputies are aware that the respite care grant was increased to €1,000 last year. Of the 29,000 people who have been awarded the grant to date, some 5,000 people have benefitted from the enhanced grant arrangements. The Department continues to receive and process application for the grant. I am anxious that the grant be paid to everyone who is entitled to it. The Department has taken some steps to bring the existence of the grant to the attention of carers.

A number of Deputies spoke about rental assistance arrangements, including the rent supplement scheme. I will examine the cases highlighted by Deputy Ring as examples of anomalies in the system. The Department transferred funds of €19 million last year from the rental assistance scheme to support a new scheme being organised by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. I am anxious for that Department to accept more responsibility in the housing area because the short-term rental allowance was never meant to be a permanent means of meeting housing need. The allowance is a short-term measure, at best. The provision of proper housing needs to be the long-term solution to housing problems.

Deputy Durkan asked me about the effect on immigrants of the habitual residence requirement, which is under review in the Department of Social and Family Affairs. This is a sensitive area, as Deputies are aware. While we are anxious to be fair to everyone who comes to our shores, we cannot have a completely open-door policy in respect of social welfare. We need to strike a balance, as other EU member states have done. Ireland's welfare stipulations, as they relate to immigrants, are probably more lenient than those of most other EU member states. That said, I am particularly conscious of the need to consider the effects of our policies on children. We take a much more lenient view in respect of child benefit as it applies to immigrants. This entire area is being kept under review. There is no hard and fast two-year rule in this regard. A number of matters are taken into account when decisions are made about applicants, including the length and continuity of their residence in a particular place, the length and purpose of their absence from Ireland, the nature and pattern of their employment, their main centre of interest and their future intentions in respect of this country. Full consideration has been given to all those issues. It is not accurate to suggest it is simply a black and white two-year rule or that a person is out of the net if he or she does not meet the two-year rule. Other measures are as important as the two-year rule in making a decision.

I have dealt with the issue of child poverty, which was raised by a number of Deputies. It is very much on our agenda, especially in respect of the child dependant allowance.

Deputy O'Connor referred to child care. It is important we do not let it become only a middle class or middle income issue and that we do not only see it in the context of people who commute, pay large mortgages and place their children in child care. Some 70,000 to 80,000 lone parents, most of whom are not middle income earners, as well as the many who choose to stay at home for various reasons, must also be considered. I would not like it to become a mark of our 21st century progress that we would spend significant amounts of money on child care.

I warn Members, including those on this side of the House, that if we decide in the next 18 months to turn child care into an electoral auction, all of us will regret it. It is a complicated, sensitive area. We need to work through solutions with some urgency and ensure child care applies to all sections of society. Members may plan to outbid each other in the next 18 months, some saying they will give €1 billion, some €2 billion, another promising tax breaks and another promising to make child care universal because all the children of the nation must be treated equally. However, if we go down that road, we will regret it. There is no major political advantage for anybody in doing this.

Deputies Healy and Catherine Murphy referred to the fuel allowance, which is between €9 to €12 and has not increased for many years. The reason it has not increased is deliberate policy and not because funds were not available. When I came to this post last year, the expert advice to me was to put funding into child benefit and the rates we pay on the different schemes. Last year we gave increases of €14 virtually across the board. However, with regard to the funding for the secondary schemes, whether fuel allowance, telephone allowance, travel allowance, the allowance for the over-80s, the living alone allowance or otherwise, it is necessary to decide whether to spread the funding available by increasing all the allowances, which would leave less funding available to increase the main rate. The increase to the main rate last year would probably have been €11 or €12, not €14, if I had agreed to the requests to increase the secondary benefits.

Members might think it is possible to do both. In reality, it becomes a trade-off. The view taken over the years, not only by me but by almost all my predecessors over the many years the fuel allowance has not increased, was that it was better to give the money directly to the recipient in the main rate. Recipients can then make their own choices on spending rather than the Government deciding this for them by providing a lower main rate while increasing the secondary benefits. That said, fuel is a particular problem this year given the rise in oil prices. In that context, the Minister for Finance and I have agreed to give the matter special consideration.

Deputy Ring wanted vouchers for taxis in areas where access to public transport is difficult, a case that has been made many times. It would be difficult to implement such a policy. It might be better if we worked through the rural transport initiative.

A number of Deputies raised issues with regard to unemployment benefit. I will consider these as we go forward.

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