Seán Ryan (Dublin North, Labour)

I am pleased to have an opportunity to debate this matter, albeit in a roundabout way. The Minister has acknowledged that there was a deficiency in the original Bill which deleted all reference to deserted wives' benefit. In dealing with this issue, the Minister and his officials will acknowledge that there is an anomaly. If that is the case, we should endeavour to deal with it. We are talking about approximately 300 people. The anomaly arises where a recipient of the deserted wives' benefit loses at least €1,600 per annum for each €1,269.74 per annum earned in excess of €12,697.38 per annum. In that context, does the Minister agree that the means bands need to be adjusted as a matter of urgency?

I also refer the Minister to the information provided by his Department, which gives a direct comparison between the earnings limits for deserted wives' benefit and the one-parent family payment. The two payments are not comparable, however. The deserted wives' benefit is an insurance-based payment — such payments generally speaking are not means-tested — with the same contributory conditions and payment rates as the widows' contributory pension. Therefore, there was a linkage all along. When the system was changed, it was linked to one-parent family payments with an earnings limit. It was only given to women who had been deserted by their husbands, not to people who voluntarily separated. The marriage breakdown aspect was investigated in all cases by an inspector of the Department. Many claims were rejected on the basis that husbands did not leave of their own volition.

Given the linkage between the deserted wives' benefit and the contributory widow's pension, we must note that no earnings limit applies to the latter payment. This situation concerns a small group of people who were deserted. The deserted wives' benefit scheme was closed off to new applicants with effect from 2 January 1997 when the one-parent family payment was introduced under the Social Welfare Act 1996. As no new applications for the scheme were accepted after that date, this would not have a knock-on effect on new applicants. A woman in receipt of deserted wife's benefit at the time the scheme was abolished was told she would continue to receive the payment for as long as she had continuous entitlements to it. In effect, however, that has not happened because the bands were not increased.

If someone wants to go out to work to improve her lot, she will suffer a considerable loss. I do not know whether it is possible to achieve this change in the context of the Consolidation Bill. A relatively large number of people from the small group that exists have informed me that they are being hard done by. Officials in the Department unofficially acknowledge that an anomaly exists but they also say that there will not be much progress on the issue because it is not serious enough and does not involve enough people.

I look forward to hearing what the Minister says on this point. If it cannot be dealt with in an amendment to this Bill, he might give a commitment to consider it and return it for debate.

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