Results 6,781-6,800 of 12,033 for speaker:Regina Doherty

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Illness Benefit Waiting Times (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: No. We certainly will not. I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle. My Department transferred the administration of the illness benefit, IB, scheme from a legacy IT platform to its newer core IT platform in August 2018. Although the system change has worked effectively for more than 80% of illness benefit customers, significant difficulties arose for a number of customers following the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Illness Benefit Waiting Times (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I probably owe Deputy Byrne an apology if he thinks I was criticising him or the Opposition. The Opposition from all sides of this House has been nothing but incredibly helpful with regard to this process in recent months. I have acknowledged this on so many occasions that I have forgotten how many, but I will do it again. When we changed over in August, we upset a system with the premise...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Illness Benefit Waiting Times (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The Department is not employing any blanket certification currently. Deputy Brady will see in every single local and regional newspaper throughout the country that we have spent a significant amount of money to inform people as to when their payments will be made over the Christmas period. There will be no changes to effective illness benefit whatsoever. People who get paid on a Monday...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: International Agreements (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I thank the Deputy for this question in particular as it is an issue on which we exchange correspondence weekly. In addition to the general EU regulations governing interoperability of social welfare between the 28 member states of the EU, Ireland has concluded ten bilateral agreements on social security with jurisdictions including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Quebec, Switzerland, USA,...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: International Agreements (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I believe the Deputy is talking about preparations for Brexit and the security of the common travel area in particular. For the record of the House, I met with Esther McVey MP at the beginning of 2018 when she was the UK Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. Both of our Departments have subsequently been in constant negotiations and discussions with regard to preparations for the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Working Family Payment Data (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The working family payment, WFP, is an in-work support which provides an income top-up for employees on low earnings who have children. The WFP is designed to prevent in-work poverty for low-paid workers with children to offer them a financial incentive to take up employment. Our latest figures, which are from the end of November 2018, show the WFP was in payment to 3,239 civil and...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Working Family Payment Data (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I am not sure that more than 86 families applied. Although I may have given the impression that other people applied for but did not receive the payment, that was not what I intended to say. Rather, my point was that some 86 members of the Defence Forces were in receipt of the payment at the end of November. The rates of pay in any public sector occupation are not set by reference to...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Working Family Payment Data (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I agree with the Deputy that in a world where any man or woman goes out to work, he or she should be able to earn enough to sustain a family. My point, which may have been made clumsily, was that when we sit down for negotiations with the public sector, we do not decide what a nurse should be paid if he or she has two, four or ten children. The salary is the salary, which is why it is more...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2019 (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The ESRI report assesses the impact of the tax and social welfare measures in budget 2019, using SWITCH, the ESRI tax and benefit microsimulation model. As the Deputy will be aware, my Department also uses SWITCH to produce an annual social impact assessment of the main tax and welfare budgetary measures every year. In general, SWITCH analysis shows that households at the lower end of the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2019 (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The budget is poverty proofed every single year because the aim in giving back workers more of the tax the Government takes out of their pockets is to improve their financial status. The aim in increasing financial payments under every single scheme in the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection is to improve the financial status of those who are entirely reliant on social...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2019 (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I am especially mindful of the draw on people's pockets at this time of year, not just of the the people about whom the Deputy is talking who are entirely reliant on social welfare, and it was the main driver of my seeking an increase in the Christmas bonus, a term I do not like. I think we should call it something else. The extra payment given to families who are entirely reliant on social...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2019 (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: -----because it is the most significant and impactful scheme we have ever had in the history of the State in helping those who are long-term unemployed to get back into employment. I am sorry, a Cheann Comhairle.

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: State Pensions (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I propose to take Questions Nos. 52, 59, 61 and 87 together. I might attempt to finish on a positive note. I thank Deputy Heydon who has had a particular interest in recent months in representing women in the main from his constituency until we get this over the line. In late September, following the phased recruitment of more than 70 temporary staff, the examination of...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: State Pensions (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The Deputy should not apologise for asking questions. I doubt that there is any Deputy in the House who does not meet women who ask the same questions at the weekend. I certainly do. Of the 79,000 who received a letter, we have completed a review of social insurance records for approximately 55,000. Therefore, there will be no need for us to interact with that cohort as the system is...

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: This was accepted as an amendment to Deputy O'Dea's amendment to commence the legislation within six months. It was changed in the Seanad to reduce it to three months.

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: The law will become law when the President signs it, so the Deputy might have misunderstood the press release I issued on foot of it passing all Stages in the Seanad. I intend to commence the law on 1 March, which is well within the three months. It is just over two months. The reason I have agreed with the WRC is that it has asked for a number of weeks to carry out an awareness campaign,...

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: Section 13 of the Bill, as passed by Dáil Éireann, contained a definition of the employment regulation order for the purposes of the Organisation of Working Time Act 1997. There is, however, already a definition of "employment regulation order" in section 16(2) of the Industrial Relations (Amendment) Act 2015 and we felt it was confusing and unnecessary to have two definitions. We...

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: Seanad amendment No. 3 was made to improve the drafting of the table of bands of weekly working hours in section 16 of the Bill, which were put forward by Sinn Féin. It is not intended to alter the width of the bands in any way, shape or form. The amendment emerged because the Office of the Attorney General had advised against using the terms "of more" and "less than" in the table....

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: This amendment addresses a previous amendment proposed by Deputy Willie O'Dea to tackle bogus self-employment. We have agreed to remove the relevant provision from the Bill and confine our efforts to introducing new legislation next year to identify and address the issues that we all know exist. While we may have different views on the extent of these practice, we all accept that it is not...

Employment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017: From the Seanad (19 Dec 2018)

Regina Doherty: I thank everybody for their contributions. The one thing I can safely say is that we are all in agreement regarding the fact that there are people in this country who are made bogusly self-employed through no fault or acquiescence on their part. I do not yet know the size of that cohort of people. I do not know if it is as small as some people say it is or as large as Deputy Brady says it...