Brian Ó Domhnaill (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, to the House. I propose to raise a number of issues concerning the new grant system introduced by the Minister of State's Department, which I wholeheartedly welcome.

In 2007, the Minister of State completed a review of the disabled person's grant, essential repair grant, and special housing aid for the elderly schemes operated by the Health Service Executive. A revised grant framework has been introduced with the objective of providing a more seamless set of responses to the housing needs of older people and people with disabilities. In effect, the disabled person's grant has been replaced by the housing adaptation grant for people with disabilities. Grants of up to €30,000 are available under this scheme, which has been welcomed by elderly people and their representative organisations. The mobility aid grant of up to €6,000 covers up to 100% of the costs of work done. The essential repair grant and special housing aid for the elderly schemes, which were previously administered by the Health Service Executive, have been amalgamated in the housing aid for older people scheme, which provides grants of up to €10,500 towards the costs of works. All the revised schemes, which came into effect on 1 November 2007, are administered by local authorities which assumed responsibility for the special housing aid for the elderly scheme from the HSE, although the scheme will continue until 31 March 2008.

I welcome the Minister of State's proactive approach to simplifying the housing grant schemes and making them more user friendly. Notwithstanding this, I ask him to consider simplifying the application forms for the schemes because I am receiving many queries from elderly people who have received letters from their local authorities seeking additional information or clarification because certain information was not provided when the application forms were submitted. Owing to the complexity of the new scheme and the administrative work associated with it, some elderly people do not furnish the additional information and, unfortunately, are denied the grant. Despite this, I praise the Minister of State's proactive approach to these welcome schemes which will benefit many people.

I strongly impress on the Minister of State the vital importance of not terminating the special housing aid for the elderly scheme, which has delivered major benefits to many elderly people in recent decades. The scheme allows individuals to have emergency repairs carried out on their homes under flexible terms and work carried out under it offered value for money and allowed many elderly people to stay in their own homes for longer than otherwise would have been the case. I appeal to the Minister of State not to terminate the scheme. To give an example of its benefits, 250 elderly people in County Donegal availed of it in 2007 and I am informed that all the work carried out provided value for money and represented a good deal for the taxpayer and the elderly people in question. In some cases, they were able to get contractors who were not C2 registered to carry out the work on a short-term basis.

I ask the Minister of State to comment on the possibility of simplifying the application forms for housing grants and on whether he will decline to terminate the special housing aid for the elderly scheme.