Michael Lowry (Tipperary North, Independent)
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Question 466: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if income from an account (details supplied) will be included in any means-tested payments from her Department; and the applications which will have this included in any means-tested assessment. [26267/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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For the purposes of determining grant eligibility, all investments must be declared, including savings certificates, life assurance bonds and other financial instruments where the interest or profit is accumulated and paid out as a lump sum at the end of the investment period.

The amount of income to be included in respect of special savings incentive accounts, SSIAs, is the Government grant earned on the savings in the relevant tax year plus, in the case of savings accounts, the gross interest earned in the relevant tax year, and, in the case of investment accounts, the investment profit earned in the relevant tax year. Investment losses sustained in the relevant tax year are deductible. The treatment of SSIAs in this regard is consistent with the treatment of similar financial products such as post office savings bonds.