Results 3,981-4,000 of 27,613 for speaker:Heather Humphreys

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: State Pensions (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: Matters related to foster caring, including any criteria relating to work, are the responsibility of my colleague, the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, and for Tusla. This Government acknowledges the important role that carers, including Foster carers, play and is fully committed to supporting them in that role. Accordingly, the current State Pension...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: My Department is committed to providing a quality service to all its customers. This includes ensuring that Disability Allowance (DA) applications are processed and that decisions on entitlement are made as quickly as possible. The DA scheme has a number of complex qualifying conditions and can take longer to process. Before a decision can be made on an entitlement to DA, evidence must...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Scam Communications (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: My Department is aware of scam calls and text messages relating to Government supports, targeting members of the public. These fraudulent messages claim to be from the Department and are requesting that people apply for supports announced as part of Budget 2024. The recipient of the scam may or may not be in receipt of a social welfare payment. The focus of the Department's response has been...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Rates (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: A simple comparison between core welfare rates with inflation does not take into account that, over recent years, changes in these core rates have been underpinned by increases in targeted payments which further support those most vulnerable to poverty. Since March last year, as the Cost of Living increased, this Government has provided unprecedented supports to protect people and families....

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Department uses a "payment week" across its range of social welfare schemes rather than the concept of a "working week." The payment week is defined in primary legislation for each scheme. I understand the Deputy is particularly interested in the arrangements for Jobseekers schemes, which are payable from Wednesday to Tuesday in the case of Jobseeker's Allowance, and from Thursday to...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Schemes (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage is the lead Department for severe weather emergencies. My department provides assistance to eligible households in the immediate aftermath of emergency weather events under the humanitarian assistance scheme. The humanitarian assistance scheme, administered by my department through the local Community Welfare Service, was activated to...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Reports (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: Social welfare legislation provides that, for social assistance schemes, income and capital (such as savings, investments and property other than the family home) belonging to the claimant and his or her partner, where applicable, is assessable for means assessment purposes. Means test rules in my Department are kept under regular review and I have introduced a number of significant changes...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: Budget 2024 targeted social welfare measures to assist low-income families with children by providing for the rate of the Increase for a Qualified Child to increase by €4 per week to €54 in respect of children aged 12 or over and by €4 per week to €46 in respect of children aged under 12. As a result, these rates will have increased by €10 for under 12s and...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Isolation (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: My Department has not considered to date entering into such a partnership with a body such as An Post. The contract my Department has in place with An Post is for the provision of cash payment services to welfare recipients and is an important contract both for An Post and my Department as it provides that welfare recipients may access their welfare payment in their local Post office....

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Social Welfare Appeals Office is an Office 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. Significant efforts and resources have been devoted to reforming the appeal process in recent years. As a result, average appeal...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Pension Provisions (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The introduction of a pensions auto-enrolment system is a Programme for Government commitment, and a key priority for me as Minister for Social Protection. Last year, I published 'The Design Principles for Ireland’s Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings System', which sets out the new system in detail. Implementation of the AE system has been gathering pace since then, with the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: My Department provides a wide range of income and employment supports to assist jobseekers and employees with disabilities, and their employers. These supports include the Reasonable Accommodation Fund and the Disability Awareness Support Scheme. The Reasonable Accommodation Fund provides financial support for people with disabilities and for employers to help make their workplaces more...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: From January to end of November 2023, there were over 88,000 investigations and reviews completed by Social Welfare Inspectors across the country. My Department received a total of 44 complaints regarding Social Welfare Inspectors over the same period. Year Total Type 2023 January to end November 44 Social Welfare Inspector I...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Employment Rights (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: In late 2020, my Department commenced an investigation into the PRSI classification of RTÉ’s contractors. RTE provided the Department with lists of workers engaged on a contract basis in 2018, 2019 and 2020 and these formed the basis of the investigation. These amount to 695 workers over the period. The scale of the Department’s investigation in RTE is significant and...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Fuel Allowance scheme is a means-tested payment to assist pensioners and other long-term social welfare dependent householders with their winter heating costs. The payment is made over the winter season - from September to April - at the weekly rate of €33 or, if preferred, by way of two lump sum instalments - one in September and one in January. Only one Fuel Allowance is...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Programmes (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: There are a number of payments and pensions paid by my Department to people over State Pension Age. Currently, upon reaching age 66, a person may be entitled to either the State Pension (Contributory), the State Pension (Non-Contributory) or the Widow's, Widower's and Surviving Civil Partner's (Contributory) Pension, depending on their contribution record, means and personal circumstance....

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Fuel Allowance is a means-tested payment to assist pensioners and other long-term social welfare dependent householders with their winter heating costs. The payment is a contribution towards heating costs; it is not intended to meet these costs in full. The payment is made over the winter season - from September to April - at the weekly rate of €33 or, if preferred, by way of two...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Bereavement Leave (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: My Department does not have responsibility for the introduction of statutory leave. An employee's entitlement to take time off in such circumstances depends on whether any provision exists in the employee’s contract of employment providing for such leave. For the vast majority of workers, conditions of employment, including bereavement leave provisions, are matters for negotiation...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Data (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: Disability Allowance is a means-tested, weekly allowance paid to people with a disability. To qualify for Disability Allowance, one must have an injury, disease or physical or mental disability that has continued, or may be expected to continue, for at least one year, and be substantially restricted from working. At the end of October 2023 there were 161,621 persons in receipt of Disability...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Code (7 Dec 2023)

Heather Humphreys: The Government acknowledges the valuable role that family carers play and is fully committed to supporting carers in that role. This commitment is recognised in both the Programme for Government and the National Carers’ Strategy. The main income supports to carers provided by my department are Carer’s Allowance, Carer’s Benefit, Domiciliary Care Allowance and the...