Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

Processing times vary across schemes, having regard not only to the volume of applications but also to the requirements of each scheme. For example, a means assessment must be carried out for all social assistance schemes, medical examinations are required for illness related schemes and customers must satisfy the habitual residence conditions. In the case of the insurance based schemes, it may be necessary to ascertain details of foreign insurance records.

In general, average processing times for most schemes administered by the Department are within acceptable levels. For example, in the case of illness benefit, approximately 50,000 medical certificates are received each week and the average processing time is one week; 95% of maternity benefit claims are processed prior to the commencement of maternity leave; the average processing time for domestic state pension contributory claims is seven weeks; and the average processing time for child benefit is four weeks where the entire family resides in Ireland.

The average processing times nationally for jobseekers payments in September were under four weeks for jobseekers benefit and under eight weeks for jobseekers allowance. I appreciate that waiting times for the jobseekers payments are too long in some parts of the country and I assure the House that we are doing our best to address this with additional staff and improved procedures for processing claims.

Other schemes where steps are being taken to reduce processing times include the disability allowance and the invalidity pension. Receipt of the disability allowance is subject to a medical assessment, a means test and a habitual residency test. It can take time for each of these criteria to be met. The number of claims has also increased significantly from approximately 17,600 applications in 2006 to 21,000 in 2008. Entitlement to invalidity pension is based on satisfying medical and insurable contribution conditions. However, approximately 90% of applicants for invalidity pension are already in receipt of illness benefit from the Department while awaiting the result of their invalidity applications.

Overall, I appreciate the need to ensure that people can receive financial support from the Department as early as possible and I assure the House that we are doing our best to bring processing times in all schemes down to an acceptable level. In the meantime, it is important to remember that people who have urgent income support needs can apply for the means tested supplementary welfare allowance and greater than 95% of basic such applications are decided on and paid within the week.

See this speech in context