Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

As I said, in the business process structure we would expect a medical assessment to be done and the application to be dealt with in four weeks. That is a reasonable timeframe in the context of the work that has to be done.

More importantly, we also provide significant resources amounting to approximately €47 million to the Citizens Information Board and the Money Advice & Budgeting Service specifically to provide people with a confidential and private information service on how they can progress their applications and submit the appropriate information, accompanied by the relevant medical certification, in support of their cases. We come across quite a few cases where people supply general certification which does not really support their case, as opposed to direct certification. Currently, there is no backlog in terms of the processing times.

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