Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I met leaders from the disability sector to brief them on the Green Paper and I explained that these are draft proposals for public consultation. Consequently, nothing is decided here. The Green Paper does not claim to be the best way or the only way. Its real purpose is to encourage thinking and discussion and to prompt suggestions. The draft proposals in the paper are designed to help people think about what might work and to encourage a focused debate around key design ideas to reform disability payments. It is the same approach we took to consultation on auto-enrolment pensions and pay-related benefits for jobseekers. I am looking for feedback, which we will analyse and build into a final proposal to present to Government. In the consultations on pay-related benefit and pensions auto-enrolment, we took the feedback and revised some of the key features, so I can assure the House the same will apply here.

The background to the Green Paper is the cost of disability report which was produced after extensive consultation with disabled people. It recommended that the level of payments and allowances should be changed to reflect the very different costs associated with the severity and type of disability. As Senators will understand, the people on disability payments range across a wide spectrum of capabilities, from those who have very profound physical and intellectual disabilities and who face significant extra costs to those who have less restrictive conditions. I believe it is right and appropriate that we recognise this full spectrum in our welfare system.

However the current system of payments does not do this. Instead it takes a crude one-size-fits-all approach. That is why the cost of disability report proposed that while we should recognise and acknowledge all forms of disability, we should also differentiate our payments and supports to recognise that disability exists on a spectrum and to target extra resources at those who need it most.

For that reason, the main proposal in the Green Paper is to move to a three-tiered payment, rather than the one-size-fits-all system we currently have. People who are not able to supplement their income with work will get a higher payment rate, set at the level of the State pension contributory, which is moving to €277.30 per week, following yesterday’s budget announcement, or €45.30 per week more than the new disability allowance rate. People with the highest capacity to work will stay on their current rate and will be provided with supports to find training and employment opportunities suited to their needs. People with a more limited capacity to work will be placed in the middle tier and their payment will be halfway between tier 1 and tier 3. They will be offered appropriate employment supports and services. We have to be honest here. Ireland is behind the EU average for employment rates for people with disabilities. I have worked to enhance the supports we have in my Department, whether it is the Employability programme, the reasonable accommodation fund, WorkAbility, or the wage subsidy schemes for people with disabilities. We need to do more to work with people and make them aware of these supports. This is about helping people who want to work; we are not going to be forcing anything on anybody. As I have said, nobody will be moved off a disability payment and nobody will see their current payment level reduced. Quite the contrary, in that many people will see significant increases in payment.

I note that some of the media discussion about the Green Paper has incorrectly stated that a new medical assessment will be introduced to facilitate tiering and that this will lead to removal from payment. I repeat that nobody currently on a disability payment will have their payment removed or reduced in the transition to a new system. There have also been inappropriate and inaccurate comparisons between the proposals in this Green Paper and the UK. I would like to emphasise that medical assessments are already occurring and have been part of the system for many decades. Some 220,000 people have been awarded a disability payment as a result of medical assessments. In fact, tiered assessments are already in place for recipients of partial capacity benefit. Medical assessors already determine whether a person’s restriction of capacity for work is moderate, severe or profound and their rate of payment is based on this assessment.

The Green Paper is not about cutting costs, as was the case with the UK proposals. In fact, based on a conservative estimate, the Green Paper measures, if introduced, would cost in excess of €130 million extra per year. As Minister for Social Protection, I would love to have access to an unlimited budget but sadly, that is not the reality. If we take the current Central Statistics Office, CSO, figures on disability, the proposal to give everyone with a disability a weekly universal payment of €350 would cost more than €18 billion each year.