Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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Question 232: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs his views on providing an option to the dependent spouses of recipients of an old age pension whereby they could receive their own payment independently with their own book or into their own account, in order that their financial independence would be recognised by his Department. [34759/06]

Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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My Department has introduced various measures over the years to make payments directly to qualified adults. For example, separate payments are made in case of domestic difficulty where a spouse might otherwise have no other form of income.

Applicants to State Pension (Transition), (formerly known as Retirement Pension) and State Pension (Contributory), (formerly known as Old Age (Contributory) Pension) may opt to have the qualified adult allowance paid direct to the spouse. Since these arrangements were implemented in 2002, some 1,400 couples or some 8% of claims have indicated their preference to have the qualified adult allowance paid in this way.

The possibility of paying the qualified adult allowance automatically to the spouse has been raised with me by various interest groups and I am examining the possibility of extending the present arrangements.