Results 2,861-2,880 of 12,585 for speaker:Willie O'Dea

Other Questions: Social Welfare Benefits Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: I agree the means test for carer's allowance is quite generous but my question is not directed towards the actual monetary calculation for entitlement to those benefits. Rather, it concerns the physical examination. It has been contended that in applications for carer's allowance, insufficient consideration is given to the totality of the situation and that there is too much focus on the...

Other Questions: Social Welfare Benefits Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: I strongly urge the Minister to look again at this area because the examination and the new approach that was undertaken regarding assessment for domiciliary care allowance have worked extremely well. Is Making Work Pay the report he mentioned in his reply? He may or may not know that we had a visit today from a delegation from Multiple Sclerosis Ireland which asked me to ask him whether he...

Other Questions: Treatment Benefit Scheme Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: I understand that invalidity pensions for the self-employed will be starting in December next. Can the Minister outline what the cost will be for that for a full year? What is the position on self-employed people who lose their businesses and want to claim jobseeker's benefit? The Minister indicated that he might introduce that scheme on a voluntary basis, as we have suggested. Has he...

Other Questions: Treatment Benefit Scheme Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: 32. To ask the Minister for Social Protection his plans to extend the treatment benefit scheme to employed and self-employed persons; if he has conducted an analysis of the cost of extending the treatments available under this scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25710/17]

Other Questions: Treatment Benefit Scheme Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: As the Minister will be aware, treatment benefits were hit particularly hard in the cuts during the recession. My question is self-explanatory. What improvements does the Minister intend to introduce with regard to treatment benefits?

Other Questions: Treatment Benefit Scheme Eligibility (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: The scheme was extended to self-employed people from 27 March, which I accept, and the benefits for both the self-employed and employees will be extended under the scheme from October next. That has already been provided for. The Minister is engaged in his own election campaign at present and I notice that his manifesto refers to a further extension of the treatment benefit scheme. I...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: State Bodies Mergers (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: The Minister will find that the commitments given by the Citizens Information Board, certainly in relation to the staff, only apply for the lifetime of the implementation process. They will cease when the implementation has actually been carried through. Why has the Department not responded to the committee which has submitted the report to the Minister? To the best of my knowledge, we...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: State Bodies Mergers (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: The Minister let in a chink of light. He now seems to be suggesting that if he does not sign off on this matter and moves on from the Department, it will fall to his successor who might very well take a different view. I want to correct a few things. On his powers to overrule or not to overrule the board, as the case may be, the Minister will be aware that this proposal is not new. It was...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: State Bodies Mergers (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: Even after the restructuring takes place.

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: State Bodies Mergers (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: 28. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if his attention has been drawn to the report from the Joint Committee on Social Protection on the restructuring of the Money Advice and Budgeting Service and the Citizens Information Service; the actions he plans to take on foot of the report; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26052/17]

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: State Bodies Mergers (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: In my initial comments, I forgot to mention that this may be the last time the Deputy opposite addresses the House as Minister for Social Protection. We wish him the very best in the future, in whatever onerous responsibilities he may be called upon to take. We have discussed the issue raised in my question ad nauseam. We had a Private Members' motion on it which was carried by a large...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: Social Welfare Fraud Cost (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: 26. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the way in which the figure of €506 million given in the "welfare cheats cheat us all" campaign is calculated; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26051/17]

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: Social Welfare Fraud Cost (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: In tabling this question I wish to make it very clear that I fully support the hardest possible line being taken against social welfare fraud, a particularly dispicable form of crime. However, I am somewhat confused about what the anti-fraud campaign seeks to achieve and how it will achieve it, hence my question.

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: Social Welfare Fraud Cost (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: In a previous written reply the Minister told me that the breakdown was between overpayments and pure fraud necessitating a prosecution and that the figure attributable to pure fraud was €41 million out of the sum of €506 million. I have some concerns about the nature of the anti-fraud campaign and the follow-up which we will discuss tomorrow at the social welfare committee,...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Priority Questions: Social Welfare Fraud Cost (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: The ministerial brief which the Minister received on his accession to office and which was shared with the rest of us details seven full pages of anti-fraud control measures in which the Department is engaged. It also gives us the interesting figure that more than 1,000 staff in the Department are employed directly in the control area and that 1.1 million reviews took place last year....

Ceisteanna - Questions: Departmental Strategy Statements (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: Absolutely not.

Questions on Promised Legislation (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: I thank the Taoiseach and wish him and his family the very best for the future. I will be joining him in due course.

Questions on Promised Legislation (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: I said "In due course."

Questions on Promised Legislation (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: As the Taoiseach knows, I have raised with him several times in the past few years the question of the restoration of the mobility allowance. As a man of humanity, he will appreciate that the continued denial of the mobility allowance to perhaps tens of thousands of people who should qualify for it throughout the country is both cruel and unfair. He promised me several times that action was...

Written Answers — Department of Social Protection: Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance Scheme Payments (31 May 2017)

Willie O'Dea: 38. To ask the Minister for Social Protection his plans to increase the back to school clothing and footwear allowance; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25709/17]