Maurice Cummins (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House. She is presiding over a Department that faces many challenges in the years ahead. She is more than capable of rising to the challenges and making the necessary changes which will ensure that people who most need benefit are those who receive it, and that those abusing it by making fraudulent claims will be rooted out and penalised.

When someone on social welfare is allocated a local authority house, he or she can receive a fridge, a washing machine, a cooker, tables and chairs and so on. I suggest that a once-off standardised payment be made in such instances. A cap on payments for different family sizes could be introduced, because the system is being abused at the moment. Payments differ from area to area and that is not fair. There should be a cap and a standardised once-off payment for this. We are all committed to helping the most vulnerable in our community, and there are currently delays in processing disability and invalidity pensions. Genuine applicants for these payments need them more than anybody else. They should be processed much quicker than they are at the moment.

The transfer of community welfare officers to the Department of Social Protection has been flagged for some time. Has the commencement order been signed to allow this change to take place? If not, when is it envisaged to take place? Is it envisaged that the same local service and the same level of service will be maintained as a result of these changes?

Review bodies are set up in the Department from time to time to examine various areas of social welfare payments and so on. They usually involve senior people in the Department and others. If such bodies are set up in future, I suggest that community welfare officers, who are in the frontline, be included in them. These officers deal with people's problems on the frontline every day. An input from community welfare officers would benefit those review bodies as they come up.

On the Order of Business today, many Members questioned the HSE's decision to withdraw transport facilities in the west of Ireland for patients requiring cancer treatment and dialysis. The same problem exists in the south east. People are going to community welfare officers for help towards their transport costs. The CWOs are not facilitating them. I can understand why this is happening, because it is the obligation of the ambulance service to provide the service. The CWOs do not know where they are in such a situation, so it will have to be addressed between both Departments, because the people most in need cannot suffer as a result of this mix up.

Excellent contributions and suggestions have been made during this debate. I know that the Minister will take on board many of these suggestions. I agree with many of those made by Senator Kelly. Like the Fine Gael Party, the Labour Party is also a broad church. Hard decisions must be made, but any decisions made by the Minister will be done in a fair manner. I wish her well and I thank her for coming into the House. I know she will come before the House again very soon to explain the internship programme, for which I thank her.