Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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Question 407: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs his plans to redress the imbalance that currently exists in the qualification criteria for the household benefits package which currently is not open to a person in receipt of a disability pension and living with an early retired sibling. [17065/07]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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The household benefits package, which comprises the electricity/gas allowance, telephone allowance and free television licence schemes, is generally available to people living in the State, aged 66 years or over, who are in receipt of a social welfare type payment or who satisfy a means test. The package is also available to carers and people with disabilities under the age of 66 who are in receipt of certain welfare type payments. Widows and widowers aged from 60 to 65 whose late spouses had been in receipt of the household benefit package or free travel retain that entitlement. This measure is in place to ensure that households who have this entitlement do not lose it on the death of a spouse.

People aged over 70 years of age can qualify for the household benefits package regardless of their income or household composition. Those aged under 70 must live alone or only with certain excepted people in order to qualify. Excepted people for the purposes of the scheme include qualified adults, dependent children under age 18 or under age 22 if in full time education, people who are so incapacitated as to require constant care and attention for at least 12 months, people who would qualify for the allowance in their own right, people who are providing constant care and attention to any member of the household who is so incapacitated as to require constant care and attention for at least 12 months.

A range of proposals has been made to extend the coverage of the household benefits package of free schemes. These proposals are kept under review in the context of the objectives of the scheme and budgetary resources.