Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)
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Question 89: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs his views on whether the practice of adapting pension rates at budget time is an effective way of dealing with adequate pension provision. [15331/07]

Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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Social welfare pensions are adjusted annually at budget time having regard to commitments or targets set by Government, available resources and economic conditions. In relation to the first, Government commitments for a target rate for pensions of €127 per week achieved in 2002 and, later, for a rate of €200 per week, achieved in the current year, have ensured that not only has the value of pensions been maintained, but they have been improved and enhanced on an ongoing basis.

This system has served pensioners well over the last decade with increases in pensions which are ahead of both inflation and earnings. Over the last 10 years, pensions have increased by 119% or 57% in real terms. This improvement in incomes is very apparent in poverty statistics based on the nationally agreed measure of consistent poverty and more recently in poverty statistics based on relative incomes.

I am aware that there is a view that we should have a formal method for increasing pensions linked to some index such as price movements, earnings or household income growth and this will be discussed in the forthcoming Green Paper on pensions. While this would ensure a degree of certainty in relation to the setting of the pension rates in the future it could, depending on movements in the index chosen, limit the rate at which pensions increase. On balance, the current arrangements appear to best serve the needs of older people, while at the same time providing the flexibility to Government to react to changing economic and budgetary conditions.

Denis Naughten (Longford-Roscommon, Fine Gael)
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Question 91: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the steps he will take to facilitate women forced out of employment due to the marriage rule to avail of contributory pensions; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15131/07]

Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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The social welfare pension entitlements of those who take time out of the workforce for caring duties are protected by the homemaker's scheme, which was introduced in and took effect from 1994. The scheme allows up to 20 years spent caring for children or incapacitated adults to be disregarded when a person's social insurance record is being averaged for pension purposes. However, the scheme will not of itself qualify a person for a pension. The standard qualifying conditions, which require a person to enter insurance 10 years before pension age, pay a minimum of 260 contributions at the correct rate and achieve a yearly average of at least 10 contributions on their record from the time they enter insurance until they reach pension age, must also be satisfied.

Women who left the workforce through the operation of the marriage bar were, in the main, public servants who were never insured for social welfare pension purposes. A person whose only contributions were at the modified rate paid by public servants up until 1995 will not benefit from the homemaker's scheme as such contributions did not include cover for contributory pensions. Accordingly, any loss of pension rights in their case relates more to their occupational position rather than social welfare pension entitlements.

It is estimated that there are some 47,000 people who are not receiving a social welfare pension payment in their own right, or as a qualified adult on the pension of their spouse or partner. These include people affected by the marriage bar, public servants in general, self-employed people who were close to retirement or had retired before 1988, when the self-employed were brought within the social insurance system, together with their spouses.

The issues in relation to this group will be discussed in the forthcoming Green Paper on pensions. Decisions regarding pension provision for them will be made in the context of the framework for long-term pensions policy which will be developed after the Green Paper has been published and a consultation process has been completed.