Results 381-400 of 16,601 for speaker:Dara Calleary

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Special Educational Needs (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Hot School Meals Programme was established to ensure that children across Ireland have access to safe, nutritious meals during the school day. This is a core Government commitment to support children’s health, wellbeing, and educational outcomes. The table below gives the breakdown of schools where the supplier the Lunch Bag and Fresh Today who have the same CEO withdrew school...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Budget 2026 (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Department of Social Protection is currently engaged in the Estimates process for 2026 which runs up to, and culminates in, the Budget in October this year. As part of this process, the Department is liaising with colleagues from both the Department of Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation and the Department of Finance. Critical inputs from those...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme is the safety net within the overall social welfare system in that it provides assistance to eligible people in the State whose means are insufficient to meet their needs and those of their dependents. Under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, my department may make Additional Needs Payments to help meet essential expenses that a person...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Eligibility (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Statistics on Disability Allowance are not collated by reason for application, and so it is not possible to give the requested figures for people with chronic conditions that significantly impact mobility and daily functioning. The following figures are for all Disability Allowance applications. The number of disability allowance claims rejected in 2020 - 2024 are shown below. ...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Statistics on claim processing are collated at scheme level, and it is not possible to provide breakdowns by individual claim characteristics such as county. The number of pending claims at the end of July 2025 and average weeks to award in July 2025 by scheme are shown in the Table. Note that statistics for some schemes are collected and published annually only, those are not shown in the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 735 and 743 together. The objective of the School Meals Programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement. In Budget 2025, it was announced that the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme is the safety net within the overall social welfare system in that it provides assistance to eligible people in the State whose means are insufficient to meet their needs and those of their dependents. Under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, my department may make Additional Needs Payments to help meet essential expenses, such as...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Under the School Meals Programme, the primary relationship is between the school and supplier. My department provides the funding for the meals directly to the school and it is the responsibility of each school board to administer the Programme in their school including handling the procurement process. The Schools Procurement Unit under the Department of Education and Youth, provides...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: A person who takes a career break is not regarded as being unemployed during the agreed period of the career break and as such does not satisfy the conditions for receipt of a jobseeker's payment. Where the agreed period of the career break has ended, and the person has sought to return to work but cannot due to a lack of a vacancy, they may apply for Jobseeker's Benefit or...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Health Services (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 739 and 794 together. My Department has responsibility for the Diet Supplement, which is administered under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, and is payable to qualifying persons, in receipt of the supplement prior to February 2014, who have been prescribed a special diet because of a specified medical condition. There are currently 709 people in...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Rates (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: As Minister for Social Protection, I am committed to making the case for a fair budget that protects the people most in need in our society - particularly families on low incomes and those people, including pensioners and carers who are dependent on social welfare payments. As part of Budget 2025, a €2.6 billion Social Protection package was secured. This was, for the third year in...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Staff (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: There are 3.8 whole-time equivalent legal advisers working in the Department of Social Protection between those dates. One of the legal advisers works a four-day week. All legal advisers in the Department have the appropriate legal qualifications.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Rates (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 742 and 791 together. Primary weekly social welfare payments are intended to enable recipients to meet their basic day-to-day income needs. In addition to these primary payments, my Department also provides a range of other payments on a weekly, monthly, or less frequent basis. These payments are considered secondary in nature and cannot be made available...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The objective of the School Meals Programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement. All primary schools are currently eligible for the Hot Schools Meals Scheme. Under the Programme for...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Child Poverty (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Reducing child poverty is a key priority for this Government and, as Minister for Social Protection, I am determined to make inroads on this critical issue. The recent research by the Economic and Social Research Institute and Community Foundation Ireland, affirms the significant work that we need to continue, and to do, to tackle child poverty. This and other research, as well as...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Child Poverty (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 746 and 753 together. Child Benefit is a monthly payment to families with children up to the age of 16 years. The payment continues to be paid in respect of children until their nineteenth birthday where they are in full-time education or have a disability. It is paid in respect of almost 1.3 million children. Expenditure on the scheme is estimated at over...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Child Poverty (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Reducing child poverty and ensuring every child has the best start in life are key priorities for this Government and, as Minister for Social Protection, I am determined to make inroads on this critical issue. The setting of a new and ambitious Child Poverty Target is a commitment set out in the Programme for Government 2025: Securing Ireland’s Future. This commitment is also set...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Primary weekly social welfare payments are intended to enable recipients to meet their basic day-to-day income needs. In addition to these primary payments, my Department also provides a range of other payments on a weekly, monthly, or less frequent basis. These payments are considered secondary in nature and cannot be made available to those who are not in receipt of a primary payment. ...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Policies (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department is acutely aware of the potential impacts of the projected demographic changes on social protection supports, particularly in relation to the funding of State pensions. The previous Government established the Pensions Commission in November 2020 to examine the sustainability of the State Pension system and the Social Insurance Fund in light of the projected demographic...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Consultations (17 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: As Minister for Social Protection, I recognise that the needs of many social welfare recipients including older people are multifaceted, in particular in relation to health, financial wellbeing and social inclusion. As such, it is important that addressing these issues is done with a whole-of-Government approach. As part of its work in overseeing the implementation of commitments set out...