Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion. It is an issue about which this group has talked many times during my time in the Dáil since 2016. I welcome the motion and also welcome the fact that the Government is not opposing it. However, no timespan has been given for the abolition of the means test. It is the most basic thing we should do in our Republic, along with having a payment for disability. Those would be two practical measures to show we are serious about living as a republic.

This debate takes place in the context of many reports. In 2022, the Joint Committee on Gender Equality made the recommendation that a person should be assessed on their individual means. The National University of Ireland did a report for Family Carers Ireland which talked about income. Family Carers Ireland's pre-budget submission called for the full abolition of the means test. Separately, we had a cross-part committee on many issues. In respect of carers, the committee's report examined the impact of means testing on the carer's allowance. The organisations detailed a range of issues to the committee, including that the means test is burdensome and difficult to navigate, and deters people from getting employment and so on. We have had any amount of reports.

In addition to those reports, the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission appealed to the Government, among 40 recommendations, to place care within the human rights framework for care. The OECD has told us that the number of hours spent on unpaid care work, valued at an hourly minimum wage, which is the wage that most women get, would amount to 90% of the global GDP. That is the context.

The amount of people getting the carer's allowance, having jumped through all the hoops, is minimal. Just over 98,000 are getting the payment. An amount of people are getting no pay whatsoever. I thank the Library and Research Service, as always, for its briefing note in this regard and its history of this issue. It tells us that there are 300,000 unpaid carers, which represents 6% of the population. Some 46% of carers provide up to 14 hours of unpaid help per week and so on. In a staggering statistic, two thirds of carers were reported as aged between 40 and 64, and 15% were reported as over the age of 65. We are here today for the umpteenth time to appeal to the Government. The only movement we have seen from the Government is that it is not opposing this motion for the first time. I also understand that the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, set up a committee to look at this issue. Words do not mean anything. I have the greatest of respect for the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and she recognised the problems. However, she said that the report would be completed in the third quarter of this year. I do not know if the Minister of State referred to that report. Perhaps I missed it in his speech because I was elsewhere. I would like clarity about where that report is because we should be discussing it today in the context of the abolition of the means test for the carer's allowance. When we go from door to door, from tomorrow or the next day onwards, this issue will be top of the list. The slaughter in Palestine, the carer's allowance means test, public childcare, housing, public transport and health are the issues. They have not changed since the days I stood in 2011 and 2016. I did not hear anyone asking for a reduction in tax, although it would be welcome to people. They asked for services. I will stick to the topic of the day. No economy can function without carers. I have read out the numbers of people who are doing it for nothing. I have read out the numbers of people who are doing it having passed the means test. What is missing is what the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission and the OECD have pointed out, which is that an economy cannot function without carers. It is time we put a cost on what is not happening — not the cost of paying the carers but the cost of not doing so.

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