David Cullinane (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 2:

In page 19, between lines 22 and 23, to insert the following:"(1A) The Minister shall produce regulations governing the method by which the requirement in paragraph (a) of subsection (1) to remain habitually resident in order for any entitlement to subsist may be controlled or verified by the Department and these regulations must ensure that any such control method or review procedure adopted results in consistent decision-making and is not overly burdensome on those affected.",".

I welcome the Tánaiste and Minister for Social Protection to the House and I wish her well in her new role. I am sure she will have a very busy few hours and days ahead. We will not spend too much time on the Bill today as we spent a lot of time on Second and Committee Stages discussing all of the issues. We have retabled amendments because we were simply not happy with the responses we received. It is unfortunate amendment No. 1 was ruled out of order. A blunt instrument was used but we must accept the ruling of the Cathaoirleach.
Amendment No. 2 deals with the habitual residence condition. Deciding officers have the power to revisit the matter of whether the habitual residence condition continues to be satisfied in their review of claims and payments. The Department needs the ability to take action to ensure payments are made only to people entitled to them. We have expressed concerns to the Minister about the eventual outworking of this. Perhaps the legislation should include some safeguards. We would not like to see a situation where an unfair burden is placed on people to continually jump through hoops to prove they are habitually resident. Anybody who deals with people on a regular basis with regard to social welfare claims, or a raft of social welfare entitlements, is very familiar with the habitual residence condition.

That presents problems for people who were born here, moved to Britain and returned to this country. They now find themselves in difficulty because of that, nor would we like to see someone not leaving the State to visit relatives because they have a fear they will be cut off. That is an issue on which FLAC has lobbied all of us. We have spent some time on Committee Stage dealing with this and the Minister responded, but we are not satisfied that sufficient safeguards are in place in this area and for that reason we will be pressing the amendment.