Colm Burke (Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister for the detailed contribution on the Bill. There has been a significant increase in the demands on the social welfare system. People drawing social welfare do not have a choice because of the changes in the employment market. In 2010, €20.8 billion was paid out in social welfare when the yield from income tax was slightly over €11 billion. Last year, the yield from income tax was only €13.317 billion whereas the health budget was €13.4 billion and the social welfare budget was over €20 billion. The spending on these two Departments was over €33 billion, in contrast to the yield from income tax of less than 40% of that figure. The Government faces a major challenge to try to maintain services and benefits for those who need them. It must ensure the element of fraud is tackled.

People have come to my constituency office in recent weeks to ask questions about decreases in their social welfare payments. One person who came to me was getting €310 in social welfare payments between himself and his wife. His wife is now getting a weekly income of €110 for eight hours of work. As a result, his social welfare payment has been reduced by €140, rather than by €110. It does not make sense to me that there should be such a disincentive to going out to get work. We need to look at this issue.

I was contacted yesterday by someone who has an opportunity to get four months work. They are afraid that if they take the work they have been offered, they will lose many of the benefits they are currently getting. The person in question found it hard to get those benefits in the first instance and had to jump quite a number of obstacles to get them. They are afraid that if they take the four months work over the summer months, they will have to go through the same loops again to get the benefits back. We need to examine such issues.

Many people who want to work and know they can get work are afraid they will be penalised for making that effort. We need to change the system to facilitate them. I understand that the Minister or one of the officials in the Department suggested that people could use text messages as a means of informing the Department, for example, that they are working this week and do not intend to draw their benefits, but will do so next week. We need to develop such a system.

The issues I have mentioned should be examined in order to ensure that the many people who want to work can get back working. The system is not accommodating such people at the moment.