Seanad debates

Tuesday, 18 December 2018

Social Welfare, Pensions and Civil Registration Bill 2018: Report and Final Stages

 

12:30 pm

Photo of Alice-Mary HigginsAlice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Thirty years has been well signalled. As the Minister said, the debate was happening in the 1990s and in 2010. People can see the signal there for a long time, but we are now at a point where we are one year away from the adoption of a total contribution approach. The idea of introducing a ten-year further contribution at this point clearly has been thought about. That is a concern and that is the reason I want a report. I accept that we might not be able to get it and that perhaps there are other ways to get the figures. We could go through parliamentary questions, for example, but we would need to know the calculations. We talked about changing work practices. Not many people in the State will fulfil the 40-year criterion given the broken work practices and periods that they have had and the unknown relationship in the future with the UK for those who travelled there and back. There are many reasons for gaps. I applaud some of the positive measures to address those gaps through a total contribution approach, but I am worried that the goalposts are being set too far out. I am happy to leave the topic. I am sure we will come back to it in the committee but I am concerned at the tone evident in the Joint Committee on Employment Affairs and Social Protection, which seems to be strongly pushing towards the further goalpost, and I believe many citizens will fall short of that.

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