Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

It would be a fair guess to say the Minister of State is ad idemwith his senior Minister. He would not be at variance with her views.

We are very lucky in this country that we have a very good social protection or social welfare system. It works extremely well for people on a daily basis. I acknowledge that and as a public representative of some years, my day-to-day interactions with officials within this Department are nothing short of excellent. The culture that exists is one that seeks to help citizens, and that is self-evident. From time to time, the process breaks down but those times are few and far between.

This Bill is an attempt to codify a culture and set of principles that are self-evident in the Department. The Citizens Information Board is a very important mechanism for citizens, as not only do people have local public representatives to act as advocates but they have the board to act as a key advocate. I have witnesses more people using that service.

Deputy Kerrane made a very good point on PRSI contributions, for example. This Bill is designed to try to give effect to processes that could be devised to make systems more efficient. The Deputy proposed notifying people of their yearly PRSI contributions, which might stave off cases where the citizen coming up to retirement has to phone a Deputy, who must then go through a process of engaging with the Department. I am absolutely delighted to do this on behalf of the citizen but if the citizen had been informed of the PRSI contributions every step of the way, the system would be more efficient. This Bill is designed with such systems in mind.

I accept the arguments made by the Minister in respect of the Citizens Information Board and I admit I had not thought of it when we devised the Bill. I accept her offer to seek to engage where there are perceived failures or where improvements could be made.

As an example, I am currently dealing with Aer Lingus workers. There is a category of workers who because of the Covid-19 pandemic are on what might be called the casual jobseeker's benefit. I have tabled a number of parliamentary questions to the Minister and we are engaging with her and some of her officials on this. People are finding themselves on what could be the wrong category of payment and they might need to be in another category so they do not fall off a social welfare entitlement cliff where payments might cease overnight. This category includes Aer Lingus workers and a new batch of workers that have come on my radar in the past 48 hours from the automotive sector. These are the Kostal workers in north Cork, Limerick and my home town of Mallow.

These workers may not meet the criteria set out in current policies and principles that determine payments. This is all to do with the fact that the working week is still Monday to Friday but there should be some changes to the system to have regard to the new categories of workers emerging in society who present for social protection but the payments cease as a result of a round hole with a square peg. They do not fit a category and are, therefore, kicked from the system.

The purpose of this legislation is to seek to put in place systems so individuals from different parts of the country, when they present a case to a local Intreo office, do not get conflicting information from various officers because a system can be put in place to "triage" such cases. A red light could be put on these types of queries if a category of worker is encountering difficulties. It could then be dealt with up the line in a timely fashion. I am confident the two categories of workers I speak of will be dealt with but my Bill would have gone some way to responding to those types of scenario.

I do not intend to push this to a vote and I accept the Minister's arguments and bona fides about working with Deputies on all sides of the House when matters such as this arise. If Deputy Kerrane's very innovative proposal was taken up, we would support it. If that emerges from my Bill falling at the first hurdle, I would not see it as a pyrrhic victory. We would still progress the social protection system as a whole.

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