Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

If the Minister of State will bear with me I will deal with that presently. I congratulate the Minister of State on his appointment. The measure was included in the Pensions (Amendment) Bill with very little debate. There is an obligation on the Government to explain the reason for the inclusion of the PPS number. I can take or leave the concept of the inclusion of the PPS number. The Minister of State is correct. All the members of the committee agreed in the June 2012 water provision report that the PPS number would be used as a means of supplying data to Irish Water. No member expressed opposition to it.

It is important for the Government to explain the background to this decision. I am not opposed to the concept of its inclusion but I wish to afford the Government an opportunity to deal with the issue head-on because some people, in particular, Sinn Féin Members, have flip-flopped on the issue.

With regard to welfare fraud, respective Ministers have always stated that they have bottomed out on what can be recovered from welfare fraud. Welfare fraud is often associated with a person double-claiming a social welfare benefit such as unemployment benefit but a large proportion of welfare fraud is unintentional. There is deliberate welfare fraud and there is unintentional fraud, which I hazard is probably the lesser of two evils. I refer to the older person who is a pensioner who may come into property or cash assets. It is not always the case that a person knows he or she is doing wrong and this is evidenced by the fact that many people never claim certain tax reliefs to which they are entitled, such as for waste collection charges. When the Department is dealing with such elderly people I ask that they deal with them in a sensitive manner. I have four or five cases in which people have been caught for fairly substantial sums. I can understand the Department's position but I can see how this situation came about in that it was an unintentional consequence of developments over a ten or 15 year period. If a departmental inspector writes to such people to say they owe €50,00 or €80,000 and demands payment I ask if the inspector would visit the person and explain what is going to be done and help them to work out a mechanism for repayment.

I ask if possible that those figures be published so that we can see the breakdown of welfare fraud in that many instances could involve inadvertent receipt of an old-age pension or a carer's allowance. It would help to clarify that fraud is not always a case of someone skiving all the time. I have come across a case whereby someone who was receiving carer's allowance appears to have been defrauding the individual for whom they were caring.

Someone being looked after is generally elderly or vulnerable, but people who receive carer's allowance are not vetted unless they are employed by an organisation or agency. Those in receipt of carer's allowance on an individual basis are not Garda vetted. I will not elaborate on Garda vetting; if one is Garda vetted once it should do for everything, whether it be a GAA club, carer's allowance or a ping-pong organisation. Those in receipt of carer's allowance on an individual basis should be vetted, irrespective of whether they are caring for family members.

When speaking on welfare issues, people like to race to the concept of populism. Many social protection measures are a requirement. I saw that if rent supplement was higher in one health board region than in another, the rents there were also higher. It is very important that those who are vulnerable and in need of rent supplement receive it, but a higher rent supplement should not drive up rents. We must get the balance right. In establishing who is entitled to rent supplement, it is important to have a standardised concept of housing need as opposed to housing desire and to differentiate between the two. Many local authorities do not do so.

One will always argue welfare benefits are not substantial enough, but I believe in the concept of taxing all welfare benefits at a basic rate, in which case in the first instance the benefits should be increased by the amount of taxation. I am not stating the actual amount of money people receive should be reduced, but to tax it and increase it accordingly so people can buy into society and have a role to play. There would be no cost to the Exchequer, but people would feel they are paying back something and making a contribution to society. This is important because there is nothing worse than being told one has never paid a penny tax in one's life. Many welfare benefits are earned and we should examine this concept. I emphasise I am not stating benefits should be reduced, but that they should be taxed and increased accordingly. When it comes to welfare issues, most Members of the House are pragmatic, reasonable and compassionate people and philosophically there is no great political divide.

There is a letter in today's Irish Independentfrom Donna Hartnett from Cork. She is a hard-working woman who wrote about getting out of bed in the morning at 6.30 a.m. and sending her children to school, the hard life she has and how she will not pay certain charges. A total of €19.4 billion out of a total of €50 billion, which is almost 40%, will be spent in 2015. One of the main faults with welfare in this country was shown where the Minister spoke about sharing the fruits of the recovery and giving the greatest proportion of the gains to those on low and middle incomes. Social protection should be about assisting people and not dividing the cake, sharing the fruits of recovery or giving the greatest proportion of the gains. It should be about assisting people so they can participate fully in life. Funding should be provided, but it should all be aimed at building up people's self-esteem and integrating them so they play a full role in society. It should not be a case of siphoning them off with a certain amount of financial benefit. The Minister stated having a job is the single best protection against poverty and I agree with this.

The best way to ensure people get jobs is through certain policy mechanisms, one of which is housing. Our record in this country on social housing has been deplorable. We are all familiar with local authority housing estates and I cry for people because of the conditions in which they must live due to the design of these housing estates, particularly two up two down apartments for elderly people or young couples. It is crazy. There is no space to play. I plead with the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government not to rush out and build 2,000 or 3,000 social houses, but to ensure he gets it right before anything is put in place. It should not be a matter of producing the numbers. Early intervention in education is also very important. We can all go into primary schools in our constituencies and identify the children who will have difficulties. Putting resources into early intervention in education will not be a guarantee of outcome but surely it could guarantee equality of opportunity and we should strive to do so.

I welcome the back to work dividend. Child benefit increased by €5 and I am a beneficiary of it myself. The living alone allowance increased by €1.30. The time has come to tax children's allowance, perhaps with a cut-off point, because it is not equitable. I am aware people state it is the one payment that goes to a mother or a father. The living alone allowance has been increased by €1.30 to €9 a week for pensioners and people with disabilities. I wonder whether there is a more desirable spending mechanism. It may be very difficult to calculate. Everybody speaks about the increase in child benefit and the Christmas bonus of 25%. Are we responding to soundbites? Are we thinking about the next general election, when people might say the Labour Party got rid of the Christmas bonus-----

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