Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)

The recent value for money examination undertaken by the Comptroller and Auditor General looked at the rent supplement scheme during the period 2000-05. It did not examine the overall supplementary welfare allowance scheme.

The report found that expenditure rose substantially during that period, reaching €369 million in 2005, while recipient numbers rose by 38% to more than 60,000. One third of the overall increase in spending on rent supplement in the period under review is explained by increases in the number of recipients. The remaining two thirds related to increases in average rent supplement payments. The increase in the average rent supplement payment is attributable to a number of factors, including family size, location and rent levels.

The Comptroller and Auditor General commented on the need to capture and record additional information which would allow for informed analysis of movement in rent supplement expenditure. The report also raised the issue of adjusting rent limits downwards when rents were reducing in order to avoid unplanned gains by rent supplement landlords and or tenants. In this regard, the Department froze rent limits in 2002 and this, together with subsequent regulations on rents charged, has had a stabilising effect on rent limits in the relevant sector of the market. Rent levels fluctuated throughout the period under review. Data from the CSO show that rents rose up to April 2002 and then fell until January 2005, and have risen slowly since then.

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