Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)

This relates to the commitment given in the programme for Government to phase out the means test for the carer’s allowance. I am genuinely struggling to understand the timeline the Minister has in his head. He told me, via a parliamentary question, that it will cost more than €600 million. He has only budgeted €10 million for next year, which is a partial year, so it works out at €20 million. By that logic, it would take 30 years to get to €600 million. I am interested in finding out how many additional people will benefit from the 2026 measures so that we can have an idea of how it is going to work going forward.

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