Maurice Cummins (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House and thank him for his comments. The issue of carers in the home was referred to earlier. I worked with the Carers' Association for over 12 months and I am aware of the work that spouses, children and others in the home carry out. It is work that needs every assistance from Government, including regular respite care. Home help workers and home carers from the health boards from another part of the community who do not get the credit they deserve. They do tremendous work in helping families cope with family members that are infirm, elderly or unable to care for themselves. We should do everything we can to help these people. We have an increasingly elderly population and that trend will continue in coming years so we need to have a policy in place to cater for them in the future.

As well as the voluntary sector, farmers' wives are a group not covered by PRSI contributions. They work in the home and on the farm but are not entitled to a pension in their own right. It is necessary to work outside the home to get stamps or pay PRSI to qualify for a pension. The Minister said he hoped everybody in the country would be entitled to a pension.

Another group not covered by PRSI are councillors. Councillors throughout the country are paid a representational allowance, which is taxed, but they are not allowed pay PRSI. This is discrimination, as many of these people work full-time as public representatives but are treated differently than any other section of the community, or any section within the public service. This should not be tolerated, and councillors should be allowed or be required to pay PRSI contributions. This would put them into the social welfare system.

It is a matter of principle, justice and equity that these people be included in the social welfare system. They give many hours working to represent their communities throughout the country. Although they receive a representational allowance, they never qualify for a pension. It is within the aegis of the Minister's Department, as well as that of the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government that due consideration be given to this issue. People who have served 20 or 30 years on local authorities will only receive an allowance or some benefit from the years after representational allowances came into being. People who spent 20 years on a council prior to 2000, for example, are not entitled to any benefit for the service. If this happened in any other section of the public service it would not be tolerated. In view of this I ask the Minister to investigate the issue of pensions and PRSI payments for local authority members.