Results 1,061-1,080 of 1,371 for speaker:Máire Hoctor

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. Given the scale of the Department's operations, with 4,500 employees, the number of cases of the unauthorised disclosure of personal data is relatively small. No civil proceedings have been initiated against the Department with regard to information security breaches. The Office of the Data Protection Commissioner intends to carry out an audit of...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. Credited PRSI contributions are an integral part of the social insurance system. The primary purpose of PRSI credits is to secure social welfare benefits and pensions of insured workers by covering gaps in insurance where workers are not in a position to pay PRSI, such as during periods of unemployment, illness or caring. In order to qualify for...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. One of the key Government commitments in the national partnership agreement, Towards 2016, is the development of a national carers' strategy. This commitment is reiterated in the programme for Government. The strategy will focus on supporting informal and family carers in the community. While social welfare supports for carers will clearly be a...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. It is one of the merits of the respite care grant that use of it remains at discretion of carers. The Department does not request accountability as to how the money provided is spent. I would like that flexibility to remain within the scheme. Caring Before Their Time? — Research and Policy Perspectives on Young Carers, the report published by...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept this amendment. The living alone increase is an additional payment of €7.50 per week made to people age 66 years or over who are in receipt of certain social welfare payments and who are living alone. It is also available to people who are under 66 years of age who are living alone and who receive payments under one of a number of invalidity-type schemes. The...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: The decision taken at the time was based on the fact that the numbers of people who live alone as they grow older tends to diminish. The trend is that these individuals move in with their families. Thankfully, their telephone allowance and other benefits remain in place but they lose the living alone allowance. The amount provided through the allowance is small but personal rates of...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: The programme for Government includes a commitment to reduce long-term reliance on rent supplement. This will be done mainly by keeping the standard means test for rent supplement under review to provide enhanced financial incentives for people taking up employment, or other professional options, and providing long-term housing solutions under the rental accommodation scheme, etc....

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. The requirement to be habitually resident in Ireland was introduced as a qualifying condition for certain social assistance schemes, including the child benefit scheme, with effect from 1 May 2004. That condition was introduced to ensure that people who have not worked in Ireland, or have not established habitual residence here, should not be able...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept this amendment. All social welfare and pensions Acts since 2001 are published on the Department's website. Future Acts will similarly be published on the website. Acts are also published on the Irish Statute Book website. It would not, however, be appropriate for the Department's website to contain an informal consolidation of the Social Welfare Acts because of...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Committee and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I do not propose to accept the amendment. All regulations made under the Social Welfare Acts are published on the website of the Department of Social and Family Affairs and are also available on the Irish Statute Book website. Also, all regulations are transmitted to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Social and Family Affairs. Following the introduction in early 2007 of a new electronic...

Written Answers — Grant Payments: Grant Payments (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: The Department received a request for funding from this organisation on the 11th December 2007. However as operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004, the correspondence has been forwarded directly to the HSE. The Executive is the appropriate body to consider the...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular case raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular matter raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular matter raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Written Answers — Housing Aid for the Elderly: Housing Aid for the Elderly (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Government policy in relation to older people is to support people to live in dignity and independence in their own homes and communities for as long as possible and, where this is not possible, to support access to quality long-term residential care. This policy approach is renewed and developed in the latest partnership agreement, Towards 2016. The focus in Budget 2008 was to ensure...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular case raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular matter raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: Operational responsibility for the management and delivery of health and personal social services was assigned to the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Therefore, the Executive is the appropriate body to consider the particular matter raised by the Deputy. My Department has requested the Parliamentary Affairs Division of the Executive to arrange to have the matter...

Seanad: Social Welfare Bill 2007: Second Stage (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I welcome the opportunity to respond to the very healthy debate we have had this afternoon on the Social Welfare Bill. I listened attentively to the contributions that were made and I will address them as best I can. One of the areas that was raised was the carer's strategy, which is of particular interest to me as Minister of State with responsibility for older people. The strategy was...

Seanad: Report on Music and Education (18 Dec 2007)

Máire Hoctor: I am conscious I am in the company of two Senators who have made enormous contributions in this area, Senator Cecilia Keaveney and my Tipperary colleague, Senator Labhrás Ó Murchú. I am happy to be able to deliver the response of the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, Deputy Séamus Brennan. The Minister assumes the Senator is referring to the arts and education report, which the Arts...