Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)

I cannot give the Deputy that breakdown immediately but I will try to get it to her. I think she is just looking for a breakdown. It is hard to know because many people, who are not currently in receipt of carer’s allowance and never submitted an application because they did not qualify, will now apply. As I said, expanding the threshold to include couples with an income of €104,000 means there will be a lot of people, who never engaged with my Department before, engaging with it for the first time. We will give the Deputy an estimate of the number we expect to come from that.

We will also be able to give the Deputy an estimate towards the end of this year as to how many extra people have come in as a consequence of the changes introduced in July 2025. It is difficult to estimate potential inflow with precision, but we will give the Deputy the figures based on the changes to date. I will try to give the Deputy as much information as I can regarding that figure. I am not fully sure where she is getting that figure of 53,000. I did not hear it.

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