Results 13,281-13,300 of 27,613 for speaker:Heather Humphreys

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Appeals (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Social Welfare Appeals Office has advised me that an appeal by the person concerned was registered in that office on 6 May 2021. It is a statutory requirement of the appeals process that the relevant papers and comments by or on behalf of the Deciding Officer on the grounds of appeal be sought from the Department of Social Protection. Those papers were received in the Social Welfare...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Appeals (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Social Welfare Appeals Office has advised me that an appeal by the person concerned was registered in that office on 4 June 2021. It is a statutory requirement of the appeals process that the relevant papers and comments by or on behalf of the Deciding Officer on the grounds of appeal be sought from the Department of Social Protection. These papers were received in the Social...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: My Department incurred the amounts of negative interest by calendar year listed below since negative interest rates were introduced. Year Amount € 2017 1,732,258 2018 1,345,253 2019 1,013,977 2020 4,501,492 All interest incurred over the periods listed above were as a...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The table below outlines the country of residence of Child Benefit claimants where that address is outside the state. The table was extracted on 02 July 2021 and represents the number of families in payment on that date. Child Benefit is Family Benefit under EU regulations and The Convention on Social Security agreed between Ireland and the UK. Under these agreements Ireland is competent to...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Birth Certificates (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The HSE is responsible for registering births and issuing certificates once registration has been completed. The recent cyberattack on HSE computer systems had a significant impact on the delivery of civil registration services with registration of births suspended for 4 weeks. The cyberattack also resulted in the suspension of the delivery of electronic birth notifications from maternity...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: 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 allowance is payable in respect of eligible children between the ages of 4 and 17 in respect of whom a qualified child...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: If a person is unemployed, parenting alone or has a disability and is in receipt of certain payments from my department, they can take part in a second-or third-level education course and receive a Back to Education Allowance (BTEA). If attending a second-level course, a person must be in receipt of a qualifying payment for 3 months or more and if attending a third-level course, 9 months or...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Covid-19 Pandemic (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Enterprise Support Grant (ESG) is available to eligible self-employed individuals, including sole traders, who close their Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) and re-start their business. The closure of PUP is a precondition of the grant and provides a financial support towards the re-opening of a business. I have recently extended the grant to make it available to those who claimed the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Schemes (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The July Jobs Stimulus set out the Government investment plan of €200m investment towards training, education, skill development, work placement schemes, recruitment subsidies and job search and assistance measures; these measures aim to help those who have lost their jobs find a new one, retrain or develop new skills, in particular for emerging growth sectors. Building on the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Freedom of Information (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The number of Freedom of Information requests received by my Department since January 2014 is set out in the table below: Year No of FOI Requests 2014 2,193 2015 2,156 2016 2,089 2017 2,443 2018 2,510 2019 2,614 ...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Schemes (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Free Travel scheme provides free travel on the main public and private transport services for those eligible under the scheme. These include road, rail and ferry services provided by companies such as Bus Átha Cliath, Bus Éireann and Iarnród Éireann, as well as Luas and services provided by over 80 private transport operators. There are currently approx. 999,000...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: State Pensions (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: A recipient of a State pension (contributory) pension can claim an increase in their pension in respect of a qualified adult. A qualified adult is the spouse, civil partner or cohabitant of the pensioner who is being wholly or mainly maintained by that pensioner. An increase is payable at the maximum rate of payment where the means of the spouse or partner are not more than €100 per...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Employment Schemes (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: My Department is currently in the process of procuring employment services for seven counties in the Midlands and North-West with no existing local employment service. This expansion of employment services is the first phase of ensuring State-wide coverage by January 2022. Parallel to this process is the expiration of the JobPath contracts. Referrals to JobPath service providers will...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Appeals (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Social Welfare Appeals Office functions independently of the Minister for Social Protection and of the Department and is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements and insurability of employment. The information required by the Deputy in relation to insurability appeal cases decided by Appeals Officers over the past ten years is set...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Freedom of Information (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Department processes a large number of Freedom of Information requests annually, with 2,614 and 1,706 requests received in 2019 and 2020 respectively. The Department is in compliance with the FOI Code of Practice which states that disclosure logs in relation to non-personal requests should be published on a regular basis. The FOI disclosure log on behalf of the Department up to end...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Freedom of Information (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The table below outlines the amount collected on an annual basis since the Freedom of Information Act 2014 was enacted in October of that year in respect of fees attached to Freedom of Information requests submitted to my Department. Year Search Retrieval and Copying fees € Internal Review Fees (Non-Personal requests) € 2014 ...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Freedom of Information (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The total number of requests under the Freedom of Information Acts received in the period from October 2014 (when the 2014 Act commenced) to 2020 is 15,744. Of those, 1,168 were refused under the Acts. The number of Freedom of Information requests refused by my Department for the years 2019, 2020 and to date in 2021 have been reviewed. This review shows that four requests have been...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The two main statutory income support payments (apart from the Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment) for people who have lost work and are unable to find full time employment are jobseeker's benefit, which is based on a person’s social insurance contributions paid from employment, and means tested Jobseeker's Allowance. Both of these schemes allow individuals to work up to 3 days a...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Covid-19 Pandemic (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Department's Back to Education Allowance provides income support for people who wish to pursue full time second or third level courses. There were approximately 6,400 students supported through the BTEA for the 2020/2021 academic year. Entitlement to BTEA was not impacted on the basis that the approved course may have been provided through blended or distance learning throughout the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: State Pensions (6 Jul 2021)

Heather Humphreys: The Deputy should note that matters related to the collection of taxes are outside the responsibility of my Department and should instead be pursued with the Office of the Revenue Commissioners as it is the primary collection agent for income tax and PRSI payments. Income tax and social insurance payable by a self-employed contributor are treated as one aggregate sum. For this reason, it is...