Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is bizarre that such a huge change is being introduced to social welfare legislation at the last minute. There was no indication of this when we dealt with the issue of overpayments not long ago in the context of changing the legislation to allow for a greater amount of overpayments to be recovered from those still in receipt of social welfare payments. It is odd that this amendment is being introduced at this late stage and it is a substantial change. We have very little information and I thank the Department's officials for the little that is available. It is no more than what the Minister has stated. We do not have facts and figures and there is a range of questions that must be answered.

The corollary of this is that if one was in receipt of a social welfare payment which was underpaid for a period of four years and one goes back to work, can one apply to the Department for the money owed? In the case of persons who are in employment and paying tax, if a person is overtaxed, there is a limit to the number of years in which the person can claim tax back. The time period has been reduced over a number of years and I believe it is now down to four or five. It is limited. Is there a limit in this regard? Will it be open to people in the social welfare section to trawl back a number of years? They do this anyway in respect of persons in receipt of social welfare payments. However, in the past, when somebody finished with the social welfare system, it was a case of good luck to them and so be it from the social welfare inspector's point of view if the Department had missed out. It had made the mistake and it was put down to bad practice on its part. However, take the example of there being an overpayment for a period of ten years which would not be totally uncommon and the Department does not discover this until the person concerned has started in the workplace. If it is discovered that the person has been overpaid by €10 or €15, that would be a substantial sum of money. Yes, it would be a loss to the taxpayer, but it should have been discovered while reviews were being carried out. If it is discovered eventually, it could frighten the life out of somebody to be faced with a bill of €10,000 or €15,000 after leaving the social welfare system and starting work.

I can offer an example. It is not from the social welfare system but from Dublin City Council's rent section. Recently the Ombudsman found in favour of Dublin City Council's rent section. For a period of years one of Dublin City Council's local offices was not assessing applications properly. A total of 700 files were found to have underestimated the amount of rent people should have paid, or the 700 files were wrong. A substantial number of people received bills from Dublin City Council seeking the payment of arrears that amounted to up to €10,000. In some cases, it nearly caused a divorce, with partners falling out because one could say, "I gave you instructions to pay the rent; why have you not paid it?" It had other consequences in other cases. The tenants concerned could not have maintenance works carried out on their houses, could not buy the house from the council and could not transfer. That is not the case in this instance, but my point is that these are mistakes made by the system. That occurred between 2007 and 2010 and it was only discovered late in 2011. If the system, despite its apparatus, rules and ability to review, fails to discover an overpayment over a period, there must be some mechanism whereby it is written off. I tabled an amendment containing the same proposal I made previously about an amnesty, but it was ruled out of order. There must be some cut-off date or mechanism, whereby the Department would not trawl back 20 years to find the tuppence ha'penny the person owed and multiply that figure by an interest amount and whatever else.

There is another aspect. If a person moves out of a Dublin City Council property and into his or her own property, he or she is supposed to clear the rent. If he or she does not do so, the council can pursue him or her through the courts. It also means the person cannot go back on the housing list until he or she clears the debt or finds some mechanism for doing so. That might have been a better approach than what the Minister is proposing with regard to a notice of attachment to somebody's wages, especially in the current climate.

The Minister stated that she takes into account people’s wages and ability to pay. We were told there was no facility to gauge ability to pay in respect of the property tax but there is now provision for it in the social welfare legislation. The attachment notice provision is wrong. We should consider the circumstances of those who fall on hard times for a second time and end up on jobseeker's allowance, or citizens who, on reaching pension age, return to the social welfare system. The key is indicating in advance that moneys are owed, thus affording people a repayment opportunity so that the Department will not eat into a citizen's pension unknown to him or her.

I am concerned that we do not have all the answers here. The legislation arrived very late so I did not have enough time to peruse it or consult experts in the field, such as MABS, whose expertise was acknowledged by the Minister. I would like to know the view of MABS. It is dealing with some of the characters about whom the Minister is talking, namely, people who have been on social welfare and who proceed to work of some kind. Immediately on starting work, bills are slapped on them, despite the concept of making work pay. In the event of somebody else's mistake, they will suffer. In the vast majority, or 60%, of cases, overpayments are attributable to clerical error. In most cases, the error is not by the recipient. The recipient must suffer the consequences of somebody else's mistake, which affects his income.

If somebody knowingly seeks to defraud the system, he should be charged. That is the mechanism by which to recover the money. In each instance of fraud, the State should apply to the courts for full recovery not only of the moneys in question but also of the cost of taking the case. There might be occasions on which full recovery, if offered prior to going to court, would save the State and the individual money. This could be taken into account. Identity theft and the making of multiple applications in different names for social welfare benefits constitute fraud. There are other occasions on which a person may knowingly submit incorrect information to make a claim. If one knowingly leaves out a considerable asset, it is fraud. In most cases, however, those who are in receipt of an overpayment discover the mistake. The Minister has already changed the social welfare code to address the limiting of the amount that may be recovered weekly. The amount recoverable is now up to €27 from the full jobseeker's allowance, a substantial amount in this climate. Are there figures demonstrating the number of social welfare recipients who have had the maximum sum, €27, recovered on a weekly basis? It was indicated that the maximum does not always apply.

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