Results 501-520 of 16,601 for speaker:Dara Calleary

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Jobseeker's Allowance is a means-tested payment for unemployed people. Among the qualifying conditions for this scheme is that a person must be available for and genuinely seeking full-time work. The estimated revised expenditure for 2025 for Jobseeker's Allowance is approximately €1.78 billion. My Department is not in a position to provide the costing requested by the Deputy.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 1355 and 1356 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. Child Benefit is currently paid to over 660,000 families in respect of approximately 1.3 million...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Eligibility (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance scheme provides a once-off payment to eligible families to assist with the costs of clothing and footwear when children start or return to school each autumn. The scheme operates from June to September each year. In order to qualify for Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance, an applicant must satisfy a number of qualifying...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: As the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is compiled by the Central Statistics Office (CSO), it is not within the remit of my Department to make any decisions surrounding the composition of reference baskets for measures of inflation. According to the CSO, the CPI 'tracks the change in prices of a fixed basket of goods and services that are representative of the spending habits of Irish...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Websites (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department's website - gov.ie/welfare - is hosted on a platform operated and managed by the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (OGCIO) on behalf of other Government Departments. I understand that the OGCIO is currently developing chatbot technology for integration with the gov.ie platform. The initiative aims to provide members of the public with accessible, real-time...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Department is committed to providing a quality service to all its customers. This includes ensuring that applications are processed and that decisions on entitlement are made as quickly as possible. Processing times vary across schemes, depending on the differing eligibility criteria. Schemes that require a high level of documentary evidence from the customer, particularly in the case...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Programme for Government contains a commitment to introduce the Automatic Enrolment (AE) Retirement Savings System. The aim of introducing AE is to address the pension coverage gap that exists in Ireland and to provide workers with greater comfort and security regarding their retirement income. The new system - to be known as My Future Fund - will commence from 1 January 2026. My...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Staff (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: For information security reasons, the Department does not readily provide details of its cyber security capacity, capabilities or technology to interested parties. To place such information in the public domain would be of significant value to threat actors who are constantly carrying out reconnaissance on the Department’s security operations, and would compromise the ability of the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Funding (8 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 utility...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: A Bereaved Partner's Contributory Pension can be based on social insurance paid by the applicant or her late spouse. In order to qualify on which ever record is being used must have sufficient social insurance paid prior to date of death, or 66th birthday, whichever comes first. A decision regarding an entitlement to the Bereaved Partner's Contributory Pension can only be made when a...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (8 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. The Hot School Meals began as a pilot project in 2019 with some 30 schools. Since then it has expanded...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: State Pensions (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Personal Insolvency Arrangements (PIAs), which are provided for by the Personal Insolvency Act 2012, are an insolvency solution for people with unsecured and secured debts administered by the Insolvency Service of Ireland. Matters in relation to the Personal Insolvency Act, including any examination of the interaction between PIAs and pension entitlements, fall within the remit of the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Money Advice and Budgeting Service (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Money Advice and Budgeting Service (MABS), funded by the Citizens Information Board (CIB), a statutory body under the aegis of my Department, is the State’s money advice service and provides assistance to people, in particular those on low income or dependent on social welfare supports, who are over-indebted. As part of its free services, MABS also provides support to those in...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Strategies (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Money Advice and Budgeting Service (MABS), funded by the Citizens Information Board (CIB), a statutory body under the aegis of my Department, is the State’s money advice service and provides assistance to people, in particular those on low income or dependent on social welfare supports, who are over-indebted. As part of its free services, MABS also provides support to those in...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Citizens Information Services (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Citizens Information Board (CIB) is the statutory body under the aegis of my Department, that has an independent mandate to provide information, advice and advocacy on a wide range of public services. CIB itself is governed by an independent Board of Directors. The Citizens Information Service (CIS), in turn, comprises of eight regional companies that are funded by CIB to deliver...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance scheme provides a once-off payment to eligible families to assist with the costs of clothing and footwear when children start or return to school each autumn. The scheme operates from June to September each year. The rates of payment for the 2025 scheme are €160 for children aged between 4 and 11 years and €285 for children...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (8 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. The Hot School Meals began as a pilot project in 2019 with some 30 schools. Since then it has...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Rates (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Diet Supplement, administered under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, 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 743 people in receipt of Diet Supplement. Based on the current number of recipients, the first year/full year cost...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (8 Sep 2025)

Dara Calleary: Child Benefit is a universal monthly payment made to families with children in respect of all qualified children up to the age of 16 years. The payment continues to be paid in respect of children until their 19th birthday where they are in full-time education or have a disability. Child Benefit is paid at a rate of €140 per month, per qualified child. It is paid at a rate of...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (8 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. In Budget 2025, it was announced that the Hot School Meals Programme would be extended to all remaining...