Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 258: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the data from the MABSIS system for the first five months of 2008 in relation to the number of new clients; the number and percentage of new clients on social welfare and by type of payment; the number and percentage of new clients earning a wage; the client profile by tenure type; the total debt owed by new clients when they first presented to MABS with a breakdown by creditor type; and the average debt owed by new clients when they first presented to MABS. [24840/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

The Money Advice and Budgeting Service (MABS) provided services to 6,608 new clients in the period to end May 2008. In addition, 1,041 people sought information about budgeting and money management. The MABS National Helpline received 3,904 calls to date in 2008.

The majority of clients were on social welfare payments (58%), the highest numbers being 1,179 (18%) who were in receipt of the one parent family payment, 1,099 (17%) who were in receipt of jobseekers payments and 893 (13%) in receipt of illness/disability payments. Some 28% of clients were in receipt of wages and just under 3% were self-employed. Clients mostly lived in rented accommodation, with 28% living in private rented accommodation and 25% in rented local authority accommodation. People with mortgages made up 24% of new clients and 8% lived with parents.

The total amount owed by new clients in 2008 to creditors, based on the debt they had when they first came to the MABS, amounted to €63.3 million, which works out at an average amount of €9,600 debt per client. Of the total amount of debt some 60% was owed to banks/financial institutions, 17% was owed to credit unions, 3% was owed in respect of utilities bills and 2% was owed to moneylenders.