Results 1,561-1,580 of 16,601 for speaker:Dara Calleary

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I thank the Senator. She is always good at getting value for her buck. The Senator raised seven issues. I welcome her remarks on carer's allowance. On the disregards from July on, a carer in a two-adult household with an income of approximately €69,000 will retain the maximum figure. That €69,000 figure was €37,000 in June 2022. A carer with an income of...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I appreciate those points. We have increased the amount of support available for the self-employed in terms of pensions and other supports in recent years, but it does depend on the number of stamps that are paid, so we will not see the full benefit of it for a number of years. People must have paid the right stamps. We also addressed the PRSI rate of the self-employed for pensions. In...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I thank the Deputy. I am totally in agreement with him on that. There is the skill and the experience of the participant and also the extraordinary life experience they bring to the company. The company and its employees win from that person. I have seen that in companies. I acknowledge the former Ceann Comhairle, Deputy Ó Fearghaíl, who introduced the scheme into the...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: We are already well above the average. I will give the Deputy the specifics provided with those subsequently. She set me a challenge about targets and I will work with Department management to set those targets. In the past year, we have appointed 69 disability advisers in Intreo offices across the country. This was previously done at regional level. The view of the Department was it...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: Okay.

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I appreciate the position they are in but the key word the Deputy used was "predictable". They know from year to year what is coming. We in the Department need to get a quicker turnaround in terms of payments to them. Jobseeker's pay-related benefit is for people in an unpredictable situation like the one we discussed earlier, where a company has to make redundancies at a late stage. We...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: Part of NAERSA's remit is to ensure we get value for money in line with the normal returns on a pension and to ensure the majority of money people invest goes back into their pensions. From what we are seeing in the procurement process for investment advisers, the fact we are bringing 800,000 people to the table has considerably reduced the costs. If those 800,000 people had gone the...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: Will the Senator email me the details regarding partial capacity benefit? We will engage with her on that, particularly with regard to her experience in the sector. On auto-enrolment, we have just completed the procurement process for the investment advisers. We have selected three from a very competitive procurement process: Irish Life; Amundi, a French company; and BlackRock. We have...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I do not think there is any evidence the Department was aware of this and did not act. We now have a special unit within the Department focusing on many of these cases. It is dealing with all of the cases. It is complex, involving going through records, including individual pay records, and how they were contracted and dealing with their employers. It is an area that I have been briefed on...

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: We operate the General Register Office. To be clear, the policy responsibility does not lie with this Department; it lies with the Department of children and equality.

Joint Committee on Social Protection, Rural and Community Development: Social Protection Issues: Minister for Social Protection (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: I thank the Cathaoirleach, the clerk to the committee and the team.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Schemes (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: To qualify for the Fuel Allowance payment a person must satisfy all relevant qualifying criteria including satisfying a means test. The means test ensures that the Fuel Allowance payment goes to those who are more vulnerable to fuel poverty, including those reliant on social protection payments for longer periods and who are unlikely to have additional resources of their own. The...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department's Oireachtas contact details was circulated to all members on 14th February 2025. I have arranged for a copy to be recirculated to the Deputy's office.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Contracts (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department has no record of capital projects for IT services with a contract value in excess of €1 million that failed to reach completion.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Contracts (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: The capital allocation for my Department is primarily used to deliver IT modernisation and carry out refurbishments on the Department’s buildings. Neither my Department nor the bodies under its aegis had contracts valued in excess of €5 million that ran over cost in 2023.

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Fraud (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department provides two main payment options for its customers: payment in cash at post offices (EIT) or payment directly into customer accounts by Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT). The payment options a person may avail of depends on the payment they are receiving, for example, Jobseeker payments for people who are fully unemployed are only paid at the post office whereas pensions may be...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Appeals (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Social Welfare Appeals Office is a service of the Department of Social Protection which is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements. Appeals Officers are independent in their decision making functions. I am advised by the Social Welfare Appeals Office that an Appeals Officer, having fully considered all of the available evidence,...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit is a new social insurance income support which has replaced the Jobseeker's Benefit scheme for people who have become fully unemployed since 31 March 2025. On 31 March 2025, there were almost 10,730 claims awarded. Jobseeker's Benefit payment rates are based on income bands which can result in significant differences in benefit payments for those near the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit is a new social insurance income support which has replaced the Jobseeker's Benefit scheme for people who have become fully unemployed since 31 March 2025. Under the Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit scheme, the weekly rate of payment for a person with at least 5 years paid PRSI contributions is set at 60% of previous earnings, up to a maximum of €450...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (11 Jun 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department has been in touch with Deputy Graves and, due to the complexity of the question and the time constraints involved, the Deputy has agreed to accept the response at a later date outside of the PQ process.