Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)

The rent supplement scheme is an individual payment to a person who needs support within the system. The payment is not a payment to a landlord. On some occasions, we pay direct to the landlord on behalf of the client. This may be for money management reasons for people who are not capable, for whatever reason, of managing the resources themselves, and happens in a small number of cases. However, it is a payment to an individual to support that individual.

The Deputy is correct with regard to the rent supplement scheme, which is why we moved to the rental accommodation scheme, RAS, some time ago. The rent supplement scheme was supposed to be a short-term benefit to individuals to assist them on a short-term basis. Clearly, this expanded into too long-term a timeframe. Working with the local authorities, the aim is to get people off the long-term payments of rent supplement and onto the RAS. That process is taking time and it will probably take another year or two to get the numbers down and to return to a situation where the rent supplement is being used on a short-term basis. That is the purpose of the scheme.

We have had a review of the caps on the rent supplement scheme. The scheme itself is under review and it should be completed in mid-year, which seems to be acceptable to everybody. We will decide what is to be done at that stage.