Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

The Government is not opposing the motion put forward by the Deputies. I welcome the opportunity this morning to discuss the important issue of the carer supports provided by Department of Social Protection. I thank the Deputies for bringing forward this motion. It is a very timely discussion.

Next Tuesday, the Government will be announcing a package of measures under budget 2025. As in previous years, in the run up to the budget the Minister for Social Protection and I have been advocating strongly on behalf of pensioners, people with disabilities, lone parents, carers and children. The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and I have always sought to make sure that the interests of carers and, importantly, people they care for are front and centre of budget decisions.

In budget 2021, we increased the carer support grant to €1,850, its highest ever level. Over the past three budgets, the weekly carers' payments, namely, carer’s allowance and carer’s benefit, have increased by €29 per week. In addition, over the past number of budgets there have been a suite of once-off lump sum and double payments to assist carers and those they care for with the cost of living crisis and rising bills.

The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, has also delivered on the programme for Government commitment to provide a pension solution for long-term carers. From January 2024, a new long-term carers contribution scheme was introduced. This significant reform enables long-term carers who have been caring for an incapacitated dependent for 20 years or more to qualify for the contributory State pension. Under the scheme, full-time carers can, for the first time, get long-term carers contributions to cover gaps in their contribution record, which can help them qualify for the pension. This reform is a great comfort and relief to the many carers across the country who have spent their lives caring for loved ones. At the end of August, more than 5,381 people had been awarded long-term carers contributions since the scheme was opened. A total of 532 of these customers have been awarded a contributory State pension, while a further 148 received an increase in the rate paid.

The main income supports provided by the Department of Social Protection include carer's allowance, carer's benefit, domiciliary care allowance, and the carer's support grant. Spending on these payments in 2024 is expected to be in the region of €1.7 billion. Since 2015, there have been significant increases across all of the carers schemes. The number of people claiming carer's allowance has increased by 54%, leading to a nearly 84% increase in the cost of the scheme. The number of people claiming carer’s benefit has increased by 81% and the cost of the scheme has increased by 92%. The largest relative increases were to the domiciliary care allowance, with a 91% increase in recipients, leading to an increase in expenditure of over 126%.

Carer’s allowance is the main scheme through which the Department provides income support to carers in the community. Some 97,406 people are currently supported by this payment. This year, the expenditure on the carer’s allowance scheme is estimated to be over €1.1 billion. As the Deputies are aware, carer’s allowance is a means-tested social assistance payment awarded to those who are caring for people who need full-time care and attention. While the caring requirements of carees may be different, this does not affect the rates of carer’s allowance. It is intended to provide an income support for the carer and does not depend on the individual caree’s requirements. The means test ensures that support is provided to those most in need and plays a critical role in determining whether an income need arises as a consequence of caring.

We have made significant improvements to capital and income disregards for carers. This Government has implemented the first improvements to the carer's allowance means test in 14 years in order to enable more people to qualify for the payment. As part of budget 2022, the Government increased the income limit for a couple from €665 to €750, and for a single person from €332.50 to €350. In addition, the amount of savings disregarded in the carer’s allowance means test was increased from €20,000 to €50,000. What is often missed is that this equates to €100,000 not taken into account for the means test in the case of a carer who is part of a couple. This is not an insignificant sum, especially when compared with the capital disregards for other means-tested payments, such as jobseeker’s allowance, for example, which has a capital disregard of €20,000.

As part of budget 2024, and with effect from June, the Government has gone further again. The weekly income disregard increased from €350 to €450 for a single person and from €750 to €900 for carers with a spouse or partner. Since June 2022, this amounts to cumulative increases to the disregards of €117.50 for a single carer and €235 for a carer who is part of couple. These changes have meant that carers on a reduced rate moved to a higher payment. In addition, many carers who previously did not qualify for a payment due to their means were brought into the carer’s allowance system for the first time. These are the highest income disregards in the social welfare system. A single carer can earn €185 more than a person on disability allowance before his or her income is assessed.

This motion calls for a roadmap to the abolition of the carer’s allowance means test by 2027. The reality is abolishing the means test would result in people who may have higher sources of income benefiting, while reducing the scope for the Department to provide income supports to lower-income households. Those carers who rely solely on the income from the carer’s allowance payment would not benefit from the abolition of the means test. As stated previously, carer’s allowance, like other social assistance schemes, operates on the basis of a means test. These schemes are in place to ensure that people without adequate means are provided with income supports by the State in order to alleviate poverty. A means test is a way of checking whether claimants have enough financial resources to support themselves and determining what amount of social assistance payment, if any, they may qualify for.

Officials in the Department have conservatively estimated that the cost of removing the means test for carer’s allowance would be an additional €600 million per annum, based on current claim numbers, that is, in other words, before adding any new inflow of claims. This estimate is based on departmental administrative data relating to the carer’s support grant payment. It is worth noting that the figure takes no account of potential flow of carers onto the scheme as it is difficult to predict how many there would be.

Census 2022 records approximately 290,000 self-reported carers over 19 years of age, with the total having increased by 50%, to over 299,000, from 195,000 six years previously. The carers' organisation estimates there are more than 500,000 family carers in Ireland. This is 200,000 more than the official recorded figures contained in census 2022. Of course, it is acknowledged that there is uncertainty about how many people would meet the other conditions of the scheme, for example, providing full-time care, and the overlap between the census and the current recipients of the carer’s allowance payment. However, if it is the case that the number of carers is this high, it follows that the cost of abolition of the means test is also high. The Department has costed a potential inflow of the people who self-reported as carers in the census. Once the inflow is reckoned, the cost estimates rise to between €880 million and €2 billion a year.

While there are some who have called for a form of payment for caring or a participation income, carer’s allowance is not the appropriate vehicle through which to address this issue. The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, has made it clear on several occasions that any such proposal for a payment for caring would fall outside the social welfare system. It is also worth pointing out that the removal of the means test would create complications with respect to exportability of the payment within the EU framework for social security, as is the case with the universal child benefit scheme. Payments might have to be made to people living or being cared for outside of the State, costing significantly more than the low to high estimates provided by the Department. This is a further reason any non-means-tested carers payment should sit outside the social welfare system.

Notwithstanding the substantial improvements made to the payments under her remit, the Minister for Social Protection established an interdepartmental working group with the Department of Health and the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to examine and review the system of means-testing for carers payments. This group is expected to report to the Minister on its finding in quarter 4 of this year. I can confirm to Deputy Berry that we are looking at the middle of quarter 4 this year. The outcome of this work and other work in the Department in respect of means-testing in general, also due in the coming weeks, will help to inform any future decisions regarding changes to social welfare payments, including carer’s allowance.

I assure the Deputies that the Government remains fully committed in doing all we can to support family carers. As I said at the outset, we are not opposing the motion. All of us in this House recognise the valuable contribution family carers make to our society and we all want to further enhance the supports available to them. The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, has done a lot to improve carers payments during her time as Minister. While we recognise that more needs to be done, we need to ensure that whatever we do is affordable and sustainable in the future.

I again thank the Deputies for raising this matter and look forward to their contributions.

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