James Bannon (Fine Gael)

Not everybody in the State has a PPS number, although I do not know of anyone who does not have one.

I would be concerned about our national security. The Minister talked about not being able to track everyone. Some years ago there was a serious default in the Department of Social Welfare to do with people claiming and at the time the Government was able to track people by their PPS numbers. It is only a myth that people cannot be tracked. Less than a decade ago evidence was produced in the media that people were collecting pensions in one city and then moving to another city and collecting pensions there. The Government told us at the time that it had addressed that problem by tracing people through their PPS numbers. I would be concerned about our national security if it remained the case that the Minister was unable to track the movements of certain people. I would be concerned also if people were still ripping off the State in various forms if they cannot be traced from one part of the country to another. The Minister said a person born in Wicklow, Longford or Westmeath but who may be living in Dublin cannot be tracked down. I ask the Minister to examine in the future the idea of automatically putting people on the register of electors.