Results 3,121-3,140 of 4,893 for speaker:Séamus Brennan

Written Answers — Employment Support Services: Employment Support Services (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: My Department administers a range of back to education supports, under the umbrella of its employment support services, to encourage and facilitate single parents and others to return to work through the acquisition and improvement of skills and academic qualifications which will enable them to compete more successfully for employment. The programmes which the people concerned pursue range...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The back to education allowance is a second chance education opportunities scheme designed to encourage and facilitate people on certain social welfare payments to improve their skills and qualifications and, therefore, their prospects of returning to the active work force. The purpose of the scheme is to assist long-term social welfare recipients who would benefit from full-time education....

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: To qualify for a full Christmas bonus, an unemployment assistance customer must have been in receipt of the payment for a minimum of 390 days prior to 23 November 2005. The person concerned has been in receipt of unemployment assistance since 15 July 2005. He had a previous claim for the period 29 September 2003 to 7 September 2004. For the purpose of deciding his entitlement to a Christmas...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The supplementary welfare allowance scheme, which includes rent supplement, is administered on my behalf by the community welfare division of the Health Service Executive. Neither I nor my Department has any function in relation to decisions on individual claims. The southern area of the Executive has advised that it has reviewed the rent supplement entitlements of the person concerned...

Written Answers — Pension Provisions: Pension Provisions (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The Government is committed to increasing the rate of the qualified adult allowance for those over 66 years to the level of the maximum personal rate of the old age non-contributory pension. A number of special increases have been given over several budgets in pursuit of this target. In budget 2004, the rate of the allowance for persons aged 66 and over payable to invalidity pensioners was...

Written Answers — Capital Expenditure: Capital Expenditure (29 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: My Department has a small capital allocation, which is governed by administrative budget rules rather than subject to the capital envelope process as outlined by the Deputy. The capital allocation for 2005 was €11.04 million, of which €5.8 million was allocated to ICT equipment, €5.2 million to Reach and €40,000 to the civil registration modernisation programme, GRO. The Department...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The supplementary welfare allowance scheme, which includes rent supplement, is administered my behalf by the community welfare division of the Health Service Executive. My Department has no function with regard to decisions on individual claims. To be eligible for rent supplement, applicants must have a housing need that they are unable to meet either from their own resources or through...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The diet supplement scheme is administered on my behalf by the community welfare division of the Health Service Executive, and neither I nor my Department has any function in relation to individual claim decisions. The Dublin-mid-Leinster area of the executive has advised that, following a review of his entitlements, it determined that the person concerned was entitled to a reduced rate of...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: I propose to take Questions Nos. 147 and 148 together. Entitlement to adoptive benefit is contingent in the first instance on entitlement to adoptive leave. The right to adoptive leave is established under the adoptive leave legislation, which is the responsibility of my colleague the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform. That legislation requires that the adopting parent's employer...

Written Answers — Departmental Funding: Departmental Funding (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The main source of funding available from my Department to groups providing counselling comes through the scheme of grants to voluntary organisations providing marriage, child and bereavement counselling, administered by the Family Support Agency. Funding for 2005 under the scheme amounted to some €8.4 million and over 500 groups throughout the country received financial support under this...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: A fuel allowance of €9 per week is payable to eligible households during a 29 week winter heating period from end-September to mid-April each year. An additional €3.90 per week is payable in the designated urban smokeless fuel zones. Approximately 274,000 households receive a fuel allowance, and some 123,000 of these also receive a smokeless fuel supplement. The scheme is expected to cost...

Written Answers — Social Insurance: Social Insurance (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The PRSI-free allowance for employees paying the ordinary rate of PRSI was first introduced in 1995. For that year, a weekly non-cumulative threshold of £50, €63.49, per week applied to employees covered under classes A, E and H and with weekly pay exceeding £178, €226.03. A corresponding allowance for individuals in classes B, C, D and S was £10, €12.69. In 1997, the PRSI-free...

Written Answers — Social Insurance: Social Insurance (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The PRSI exemption on low earnings was first introduced in 2000. For that year, employees covered under classes A, B, C, D, E and H, with reckonable weekly earnings of not more than £226, €287, were exempt from paying PRSI for that week. The exemption threshold has not changed since. It is estimated that an upward change in the current €287 exemption level to €400 or €500 would...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The estimated cost of increasing child benefit by €40 per month across the board is €530 million in a full year. The cost of increasing child benefit by €40 per month for children aged under 5 years of age is estimated at €144 million in a full year.

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The person concerned claimed farm assist on 18 April 2005. He was asked to supply certain documentation and information in connection with his claim. He failed to supply the relevant information. His claim was disallowed on the grounds that he failed to prove, to the satisfaction of the deciding officer, how he supported himself and his wife since February 2003, given that he has no recorded...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The supplementary welfare allowance scheme is administered on my behalf by the community welfare division of the Health Service Executive. Neither I, nor my Department, have any function in deciding entitlement in individual cases. The Dublin-mid-Leinster area of the executive has advised that the person concerned applied recently for a supplementary welfare allowance. It has no record of a...

Written Answers — Departmental Staff: Departmental Staff (24 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: I understand that the Deputy's inquiry relates to recruitment policy in my Department, and the agencies for which I have responsibility, with particular regard to the decision taken by Government in December 2002 which set targets for staffing levels in the public service. In this regard my Department, the Family Support Agency, the Pensions Board, the Office of the Pensions Ombudsman and...

Written Answers — Social Insurance: Social Insurance (23 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The employee PRSI ceiling is reviewed annually in accordance with the legislative stipulations of the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Act 1993. The legislation requires the Minister to take into account any changes in the average earnings of workers in the transportable good industries as recorded by the Central Statistics Office. The 2006 Abridged Estimates assumes an increase in the employee...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (23 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The household benefits package, which comprises the electricity-gas allowance, telephone allowance and television licence schemes, is generally available to people living permanently in the State, aged 66 years or over, who are in receipt of a social welfare type payment or who satisfy a means test. The package is also available to carers in receipt of a carer's allowance and to people with...

Written Answers — Social Welfare Benefits: Social Welfare Benefits (23 Nov 2005)

Séamus Brennan: The aim of the national fuel scheme is to assist householders that are in receipt of long-term social welfare or Health Service Executive payments towards their additional heating needs during the winter season. As a long-standing policy within the scheme, fuel allowances are not payable in cases where a person has access to their own fuel supply, or is benefiting from a subsidised heating...