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

I want to be clear: my job in social protection is to provide people with a basic income. I cannot pay carers for the work they do; that is just the way it is. That is why I am setting up an interdepartmental group with the Department of Health in order that we can look at this whole area, have an open and frank discussion about it and see how we can adequately support carers for the work they do.

Deputy Moynihan asked how many carers who come off the carer's benefit and continue to get the carer's support grant do not get the carer's allowance. It is a fair question and I will get the figure for him. We should feed that information in when we are looking at this and I will be happy to take on board those views. If I had unlimited resources, we could do everything but, unfortunately, I have limited resources and have to target them at those who need them most. As in the case of disabilities, there are people who provide 24-7 care and there are others who have less onerous care responsibilities, but at the moment it is a flat payment. Maybe that is another question we need to look at. These are all discussions we can tease out over time.

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