Tom Sheahan (Kerry South, Fine Gael)

I will be specific in my comments. Accessibility to one's entitlements for social protection is becoming more difficult and I have one specific case in mind, on which I have been working for nearly two years. A mother of two children died tragically, leaving an 18-month-old child and three-year-old child behind. Six weeks after, the father of these children had a stroke and he is now incapacitated on one side. The aunt of those children took them in on the night their mother died and to this day she has not got one cent from the State for looking after those two children. The woman applied for guardianship but was not awarded it because the children did not go into care. If they had gone into care for one night she would have qualified for it but she did not leave them into care because we know what has happened with children in care. She did not want that, yet she was not assured that they would be left to her although she wanted to look after them. She applied for the fostering grant but was refused.

I have worked on this for two years and have been hopped around to different Ministers while this poor woman has not been helped in any way by the State. The main appeals office on D'Olier Street is very poorly run in my experience.

With regard to other aspects of social protection, a self-employed man with ten staff working for him may have his business go to the wall. He would collect PRSI and PAYE for the State from the staff, paying it on their behalf. His staff can receive payments from social welfare on contributions for nine months the week after they have been let go. The man whose business has gone to the wall has no entitlements and he would have to wait 18 months before he can get any payment. This man may have a wife and family as well. Such a man can be sent to the community welfare officer but invariably such people are unsuccessful when they take that approach.

Employees who lose their jobs get nine months payments from stamps and then one is means-tested. How are non-nationals who have sent every bob they earned in this country out of State means-tested for the jobseeker's payment? I am not being racist but I am looking for equity and equal access to benefits. Somebody may be able to answer how the Department of Social Protection carries out a means test for non-nationals who have been working here when all their money has been sent home.

There should be a charter of rights for the self-employed because their entitlements are archaic. Many of these people who have lost their businesses are the new poor. They may have invested heavily in business, staff and recruitment, as well as education and other improvements for staff, before finding their business gone. I hope something can be done for those who I see as the new poor; they are the self-employed whose businesses have gone to the wall. I welcome any comments on this from the Minister.

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