Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for this question. The purpose of an additional needs payment is to assist with essential, once-off expenditure which a person could not reasonably be expected to meet out of their weekly income.

In 2022, over 97,000 additional needs payments were issued at a total value of over €58 million. More than €66 million has been provided for additional needs payments in 2023. However, the budget for this scheme is demand-led and is not subject to an overall cap. There are 412 staff across all grades in the community welfare service, including 323 community welfare officers based locally throughout the country.

In light of the increased level of applications, agreement had been reached for approximately 74 additional staff to be assigned to the community welfare

service. Recruitment has commenced for these additional staff through a combination of appointments from Public Appointments Service panels, internal promotions and expressions of interest from existing staff within the Department.

We are on track to have these additional staff in place by the end of the first quarter of this year. In the interim, 30 social welfare inspectors were temporarily reassigned to assist with claims processing. This and other measures undertaken during the past year mean there are no backlogs at present and work on hand is within the schemes normal processing levels.

Completed applications are finalised within two weeks and there is less than two weeks work on hand currently.

Where it is clear that a person has an urgent or immediate need, every effort is made to ensure that the claim is processed on the same day. Community welfare officers are very experienced and can generally assess when a case is so urgent that it requires an immediate response. Approximately 10% of payments to customers across the country are made on this basis, which shows just how responsive the service is to an urgent customer need.

See this speech in context