Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputies on all sides of the House for their contributions on Second Stage in the past couple of days. I will take up a point made by Deputy Bernard J. Durkan about the people who have gone through the greatest trauma in the past six or seven years. Some have still not recovered, which is why when I opened the debate last Thursday, I spoke about how I hoped the Bill reflected the values and principles that underpinned the budget in its entirety. We will continue to enhance the supports for those who rely on what comes from my Department. Equally, we will ensure anybody who goes out to work sees the value of that work and the difference in lifestyle they have by being in employment as opposed to being supported by the Department. We are going to do that in the context of the overarching commitment to enable the development of a recovering economy. In response to Deputy Billy Kelleher, I hope it will not be in the interests of some citizens only but in the interests of all citizens. While I appreciate that many of the Deputies who spoke in the past couple of days have recognised that there are some positive measures in the Bill, to use somebody's phrase, "there is a lot done but there is an awful lot more to do".

I will respond on a few issues raised by Deputies in the past couple of days. The first is the 2012 pensions issue which I think was raised by everybody who spoke in the past couple of days. I acknowledge the 200 pensioners who stood outside the gates of Leinster House this evening. Unfortunately, I did not get out to meet them because I was in the Chamber, but I acknowledge their presence.

I respect the reasons they were standing outside the door and pay tribute to Deputy Bríd Smith who probably organised them and the speakers who spoke on their behalf to come out. I thank her for that. I spoke last Thursday at the joint committee on this issue. As I have said on a number of occasions, we are examining in depth the various options to provide some relief to those who would have a higher contributory pension had the bands not been amended in 2012. If there are equitable changes that target such relief to those who were particularly affected by this anomaly under the yearly averaging system, I will bring those options to our Cabinet sub-committee in the next couple of weeks where we will discuss the best proposal to fix this before I bring it to Cabinet.

Deputies talk about the large number of women who are affected by this anomaly. Everybody seems to have a different reason there was a large number of women affected by it but it is not just women. I do not want us to discount the women who are affected but there are quite a considerable number of men affected by it too. This woman, and this particular Minister, has already made a commitment to fix it. I reiterate that commitment. I acknowledge, as hopefully everybody does, that it will require new money. I do not have the money in this Social Welfare Bill but we will fix it and we will find the money in the course of the next 12 months, if not sooner.

I will talk about child poverty because the consistent level of poverty among children has been raised by a number of Deputies in this debate. It is something I have mentioned on a number of occasions since I was lucky enough to get this job in June, because it is a priority. It is a priority for every side and every party and representative in the House. There are some positive, albeit small, signs and they are going in the right direction. The latest CSO figures show that 11.5% of our children are living in consistent poverty. While that is unacceptably high, it is a reduction of approximately 9%, or 13,000 children, since last year. The real reason I take solace in that is because it is the first decrease since 2008. It means that some of the changes we made in last year's budget are having an impact. Everybody acknowledges there are far more changes with regard to children in this budget than there were last year. We are seeing a drop in the figures so hopefully we will see a much larger drop between now and next year.

The monthly unemployment rate in October was 6%, which is down from a 2012 peak of 15%. Unemployment is strongly linked to poverty so further decreases in poverty will arise from the reduction in unemployment figures. It can also be expected that the measures introduced in the interim will have a positive impact. In 2018, the qualified child increase, which will be paid on a weekly basis, will rise from €29.80 to €31.80, which is an increase of 6.7%. While I acknowledge it is only small, it is something that has not been increased in nearly eight years. While we might be taking small steps, we are going in the right direction. I hope we will be able to increase it this time next year as well.

For a second year running, the budget is increasing the weekly rates of payments for all working age schemes. We have raised the income disregard for one-parent families and jobseeker's transitional payments. The Department will spend in excess of €3 billion in 2017 providing income supports for families through child benefit, qualified child increases and welfare payments. The working family payment and the back to school clothing allowance will all go towards trying to alleviate an unacceptable level of persistent child poverty. Social transfers play a huge part in alleviating this. They are quick and genuinely effective.

Deputy Curran raised the issue of families who are in receipt of mortgage interest supplement in view of the fact that the scheme will be closed at the end this year. The scheme was closed to new entrants from 1 January 2014. Over the following years, the number of people relying on this payment has reduced greatly. The 1,200 or so families that are still receiving it need the payment. They are still in exceptional circumstances as a result of the difficulties of the past ten years. It would not be right to take that payment from them so we will continue to look after those people. Hopefully as the numbers reduce the scheme will unwind itself. I confirm the payment of income supplement will continue to be made to those customers after the closing date of the scheme. I expect its value will arrive at about €2.4 million this year. Provision has been made in the Department's Vote, but not under the existing heading. Over the next couple of days we propose to write to all of the people who are currently on the scheme to reassure them it will be there for as long as they need it. As employment improves and the economy recovers, we expect a reduction in those numbers.

A number of Deputies have commented that the increase in the weekly rate of social welfare payment will not commence until the end of March. I would love, as most other people in the House would, if it was on 1 January. The aim will be for us to try to move it to as close to 1 January as we can. We had other items we wanted to introduce this year, which we would have not have been able to, and some directly relate to children's poverty. Examples are fuel allowance and telephone allowance for old age pensions who are living in isolation. If we had increased the payment on 1 January for all working age and pension payments, we would not have been able to make very valuable contributions in that area. I thank people for allowing us to do that.

There were a number of references made by Deputies to the living alone allowance, the bereavement grants, the potential for jobseeker's allowance to be extended to people who are self-employed and the invalidity payment. I will not go into all of them but perhaps we can talk further about them on Committee Stage. I thank everybody for their contributions and commend the Bill to the House.

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