Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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Question 103: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs if he will provide details of each of the non-statutory schemes provided by his Department; the expected expenditure on each of these schemes in 2007; and the reason his Department operates a policy of not back-dating old claims on such schemes. [26283/07]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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My Department operates the following non statutory schemes:

Household Benefits Package

Free Travel

Back to Work Allowance

Back to Education Allowance

National Fuel Allowance

Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance

Household Benefits Package

The household benefits package, which comprises the electricity, natural gas allowance, telephone allowance and free television licence is available to persons living permanently in the State who satisfy specific qualifying conditions. There are currently some 350,000 customers in receipt of the household benefits scheme at an annual cost of €315 million in 2007.

Provisions for backdating of household benefit applications have been aligned with regulations on backdating of late claims in the SocialWelfare (Consolidated Payments Provision) (Amendment) (No. 8) (Late Claims) Regulations, 2000 (S.I. No. 159 of 2000)]. Under the Regulations an application for household benefit package may be backdated for a maximum of six months where there is an underlying entitlement. In certain circumstances a claim can be backdated for a period in excess of six months.

Free Travel

The Free Travel scheme provides free travel on a range of transport services on the island of Ireland to 600,000 customers at an annual cost of €64 million in 2007. It is not the policy of my Department to backdate entitlement to free travel.

Back to Work Allowance

The back to work allowance scheme is part of programme of initiatives designed to assist long term unemployed people, lone parents and other social welfare recipients to return to the active labour force. The allowance provides a monetary incentive designed to make return to work financially attractive and viable. The expenditure on the back to work/back to work enterprise allowance scheme for 2007 is estimates at €73.5m.

Back to work applications should be submitted 14 days before the employment commences, in order to be approved. However, applications may be accepted up to one month after work commencing, provided that the claimant has signed off at the appropriate time. In certain limited circumstances applications may be accepted outside the one month limit.

Back to Education Allowance

The back to education allowance (BTEA) facilitates people on certain social welfare payments to improve their skills and qualifications and, therefore, their prospects of returning to the active work force. The scheme enables qualified people who have been getting a social welfare payment to continue to receive a payment while pursuing an approved full-time education course. The estimated expenditure on the scheme for 2007 is €68.5m.

National Fuel Allowance

The national fuel allowance scheme assists householders on long-term social welfare or health service executive (HSE) payments with meeting the cost of their heating needs during the winter season. Fuel allowances are paid for 29 weeks from end-September to mid-April. The allowance represents a contribution towards a person's normal heating expenses. It is not intended to meet those costs in full. It is estimated that some 286,200 households benefit under the scheme at an annual cost of €161.5m. Fuel allowance is paid from the date of application, backdating may occur where there are extenuating circumstances and applies to individual cases only.

Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance

The back to school clothing and footwear allowance scheme (BSCFA) operates from the beginning of June to the end of September each year and is administered on behalf of this Department by the Community Welfare division of the Health Service Executive. The BSCFA scheme provides a one-off payment to eligible families to assist with the extra costs when their children start school each autumn.

Current indications are that 82,000+ families with approximately 174,000+ children will benefit from the scheme this year. A total of €38.1 million has been allocated for BSCFA for 2007 and it is expected that this amount will be expended in full.

BSCFA claims are only paid for the year in which applications are made, however depending on the circumstances of a particular case; Community Welfare Officers have the discretion to make exceptional needs payments in the event of late applications for BSCFA.