Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)

They did but we are talking about an individual entitlement and unlike everyone else in the State, they do not pay PRSI on amounts up to €287 per week.

I wish to refer to the question raised by the case of McHugh v. the Department of Social Welfare. The case was heard in the High Court in 1990. It was appealed and a decision was handed down in 1992. It was to do with a regulation made by the Minister for Social Welfare in 1987 about overlapping payments. That case was taken and under the regulation, the implication was that they were seen as ultra vires in that the Minister did not have the power to remove an entitlement to payment which is given in the primary legislation by way of secondary legislation. That was changed in the Social Welfare Act 1991. Therefore, the primary and secondary legislation are at one. It was on that basis that a new provision was passed in the 1991 Act, where, under the Consolidation Act, new provisions provided that where a person has an entitlement to more than one social welfare payment at any one time, only one is payable. It was reverted back in that legislation.