Results 141-160 of 14,252 for speaker:Dara Calleary

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Projects (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Department of Social Protection receives EU Funding under the following EU programmes. The current programme is the European Social Fund Plus Employment, Inclusion, Skills and Training Programme (ESF+EIST 2021-2027) which is a cross-Government programme managed by the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research Innovation and Science. The Department has four schemes within...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Staff (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: Overpayments of social welfare assistance and benefit payments arise because of decisions made under the relevant sections of the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Act, 2005 (as amended). Customers who have been overpaid social welfare have a liability to refund the overpayment as they have been in receipt of a payment to which they were not entitled. The Department has a central debt unit...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Staff (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The delivery of vital locally based Community Welfare Services (CWS) to meet the challenges and the needs of citizens across the country is a priority for me and for my Department. The Community Welfare Service provides a flexible service to meet the different needs of people, who may find themselves in a financially difficult or vulnerable situation. It is a priority that this service is...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Departmental Strategies (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: A national Youth Homelessness Strategy was published in November 2022 and aims to help young people aged 18 - 24 years who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. My department is represented on the Youth Homelessness Strategy Steering Group and is responsible for delivering on Action 25 of the Youth Homelessness Strategy. This action is to “Review work experience, placements,...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: Under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, my department may make Additional Needs Payments to help meet essential expenses that a person cannot pay from their weekly income or other personal and household resources. This is an overarching term used to refer to exceptional and urgent needs payments, and certain supplements. The scheme is demand led and payments are made at the...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Benefits (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Programme for Government commits to examining the introduction of a Pay Related Carer’s Benefit for individuals who have to give up work suddenly in order to provide full-time care. In terms of roll-out of Pay-Related Benefits, the Programme for Government also contains a commitment to introduce a Pay-Related Parent’s Benefit. The new Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The person concerned reached pension age on 15 January 2025. To be eligible for the standard state pension (contributory) an individual must have at least 520 full-rate contributions. To qualify for a mixed insurance pension, 520 employment contributions are required, of which at least 260 must be full-rate contributions with the remainder made up of modified contributions. The...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Payments (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Humanitarian Assistance Scheme (HAS), administered by my department through the Community Welfare Service (CWS), was activated on 23 January 2025 to assist householders affected across the country by Storm Éowyn. According to the records of the Department, the person concerned applied for a HAS stage 1 payment to assist with the additional costs incurred as a result of Storm...

Written Answers — Department of Rural and Community Development: Rural Schemes (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The CLÁR programme is a targeted investment programme that provides funding for small scale infrastructural projects in designated rural areas. Since 2017, almost €1.6 million has been awarded in County Meath for some 43 CLÁR projects . The attached table outlines the projects approved and the amount of CLÁR funding awarded to those projects in Co Meath from 2023 to...

Written Answers — Department of Rural and Community Development: Rural Schemes (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: I propose to take Questions Nos. 276 and 278 together. The Local Improvement Scheme (LIS) supports improving rural roads and laneways not usually maintained by local authorities. Since its establishment in 2017, almost €170 million has been provided by the Government to local authorities for LIS. While the Department provides funding for LIS, the scheme is administered by local...

Written Answers — Department of Rural and Community Development: Rural Schemes (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department provides the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (OCAG) with the amounts paid to each local authority in each year, for inclusion in their Report on the Accounts of the Public Services. As my Department was established in 2017, I have provided the information for 2017 to 2024 inclusive. I would note that the 2024 figures remain provisional until the OCAG report...

Written Answers — Department of Rural and Community Development: Rural Schemes (30 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The current LEADER Programme runs to 2027 and is now up and running across the country. It supports a broad range of enterprises and community groups to develop projects which improve the quality of life and economic activity in rural areas. It is delivered through Local Action Groups across rural Ireland. A feature of the LEADER programme is that it is based on a community-led, bottom-up...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: My Department provides a suite of income supports for those unable to work due to illness or disability. These include insurance-based schemes, based on Pay Related Social Insurance (PRSI) contributions, and means-tested social assistance schemes. Invalidity Pension is a weekly payment to people who are regarded as being permanently incapable of work because of a long-term illness or...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) was introduced in 2020 in response to the unprecedented disruption caused to the Irish labour market on foot of the Covid-19 Pandemic. Some 880,000 people received at least one payment under the scheme. In total, some 30 million individual payments issued under the scheme. The Department is undertaking a number of reviews aimed at identifying cases...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: Treatment Benefit is a PRSI-based scheme which provides free dental and optical services, along with assistance towards the provision of audiological appliances and hair replacement products, to people who satisfy certain qualifying conditions, and to their dependent spouses/partners. The Department is committed to an annual review of the Treatment Benefit Optical scheme. The Department...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: Child Benefit is a monthly payment to the parents or guardians of children under 16 years of age. Child Benefit can also be claimed for children aged 16,17 and 18 if they are in full-time education or full-time training or have a disability and cannot support themselves. Child Benefit becomes payable in respect of newborn babies in the month after their birth. As part of Budget 2025, a...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Government is very aware of the key role that family carers play in Irish society and the challenges they face and is fully committed to supporting carers in that role. From July 2025, the weekly income disregard for Carer's Allowance will increase from €450 to €625 for a single person, and from €900 to €1,250 for carers with a spouse or partner. This will...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Homemakers Disregard Scheme was introduced in April 1994 for use in the Yearly Average (YA) calculation of the State Pension (Contributory). This allowed an applicant to apply under the Homemaker's Scheme for those years out of the workforce since April 1994 spent caring for children under age 12 or other dependent relatives to be disregarded in the calculation under the Yearly Average...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: School Meals Programme (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The objective of the School Meals Programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement. Funding under the programme is solely for food. My Department has engaged with a number of schools...

Written Answers — Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection: Social Welfare Schemes (10 Apr 2025)

Dara Calleary: The Department provides support for workers on Short-Time Work under the Jobseeker's Benefit scheme. This is an income support payment for those who have been temporarily placed on a shorter working week by their employer and which has worked effectively in response to challenges facing businesses. For example, if a person's working week has been reduced from a 5 day work pattern to a 3...