Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Question 922: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs if she will estimate the amount of money that would be raised by abolishing the PRSI ceiling; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [1251/09]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Current estimates indicate that the abolition of the PRSI ceiling would yield some €223 million additional contribution income in a full year.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Question 923: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs if there will be a PRSI surplus for 2009; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [1255/09]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Question 930: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the accumulated surplus of the social insurance fund at the end of 2008; the projected balance in 2009, 2010 and 2011; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [2298/09]

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Question 972: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the estimated surplus that will be added to the social insurance fund during 2009. [1518/09]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 923, 930 and 972 together.

Full information on the position of the Social Insurance Fund at the end of December 2008 is not yet available. However, current indications are that there was an excess of expenditure over income of the order of €200 million. At the beginning of 2008, there was an accumulated surplus of over €3.6 billion in the Fund. The estimates relating to the Social Insurance Fund which were published in the Budget 2009 documentation predict an excess of expenditure over income to the Fund in 2009 of the order of €902 million. This will erode the accumulated surplus by an equivalent amount. The data relating to the accumulated surplus will be updated to take account of the 2008 end-year position in the Revised Estimates Volume for 2009.

It should be noted that the Actuarial Review of the Social Insurance Fund which was published in October 2007 predicted that the Fund would run an annual deficit from 2009 with the result that the accumulated surplus would be exhausted by 2016.