Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State and her officials for the briefing I got earlier today to try to go through these 20 pages of amendments. I accept that the Minister of State flagged these issues on Committee Stage and, based on the briefing I got today, I also accept that a substantial number of the amendments relate to partners. This is a complex issue to reflect in the legislation and that is why we have so many complex amendments before us. However, it is not good practice to have 20 pages of amendments with very short notice given to try to interpret them. Not only are we looking at the amendments reflected in this legislation but because this Bill is amending primary legislation, we have to look at three sets of documents to try to decipher what is in them.

Based on the explanation the Minister of State has given, I am not sure whether this applies to a husband and wife where the farm is one or both of their names. As the Minister of State knows, the tradition now is that both the husband and wife have their names on the property and that is incentivised and encouraged. That is transitioning through Irish society.

First, where either spouse does not have a name on the asset but would have a legal right to 50% of it, are they caught under this definition? Second, where their name is on that asset, would they be caught under this definition? Third, we are talking about a single asset like a farm. We have decided, and there is unanimous agreement across this House, that there would be a three-year cap on nursing home fees for that particular asset. The Minister of State is telling us that there is three-year cap per individual. Where there is a couple involved, there is potential six-year cap. The belief was that people would only have to pay for three years where there are two older people in a nursing home but they will have to pay for six years before they can avail of the cap. That is new and that was not the belief we had. The belief was that the asset could only be charged in the context of three years, not six. I ask the Minister of State to clarify how that would apply.

The related issue is backdating. The decision was taken six years ago to implement this legislation and the Government decision on this legislation was made three years ago. I asked the Minister of State on Committee Stage to consider the example I supplied to her. That was the example of John and Michael. John signed over the farm, including the land and entitlements, in February 2010 to his son Michael in totality. John subsequently went into long-term nursing home care in January 2015 and Michael has been paying 7.5% of the capital value of the farm towards the nursing home costs up until now. John will now have to sign a declaration to make Michael a successor, even though Michael has held the land in his name for the past 11 years. The difficulty is that the six years only start from now. There will be a charge levied against that particular farm for the next six years. We are saying that for 17 years that land either has money being drawn off it or a charge placed on it because the six years itself is not backdated to the time of entry into the nursing home; it is only from here forward or from the time that the asset was signed over.

I accept that this is complex legislation. I know it has gone through a tortuous process to get to this point but those two anomalies will cause huge difficulties down the road for many farm families.

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