Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

One of the purposes of social dialogue is to address the question of poverty. I raise the issue, as the social welfare Bill begins its journey to the Dáil, of the fact that the series of one-off payments the Government is giving to help people with the crippling cost-of-living crisis as we head towards the winter will not be extended to people who are on short-term payments. This is grossly unfair. We raised it with the Taoiseach last year and the Government was prompted to make some changes. I am asking him to extend the fuel allowance, and the one-off payments that flow from it, to people who deserve it every bit as much as those who are getting it. Why on earth would people on short-term payments such as, for example, the back to education allowance or illness benefit, not be entitled to the fuel allowance and the one-off payments that flow from it? They are not going to get it. With regard to the back to education allowance, I am dealing with a case of somebody who is going back to education and who previously received the fuel allowance. They are now going back to education, which is a good thing, to try to upskill themselves to contribute to and to work in our economy, but they are effectively being punished because they are not entitled to fuel allowance or the one-off payments. A wide range of people on those short-term payments are not getting these benefits and I ask the Taoiseach to address this in the social welfare Bill so people get these one-off payments and the fuel allowance.

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