Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)
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Question 140: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the position in relation to the publication of a carer's strategy. [9299/09]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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During 2008 an interdepartmental group, chaired by the Department of the Taoiseach, with secretariat support provided by my Department, undertook work to develop a national carers strategy. Unfortunately, in the current economic climate it is not possible to consider introducing any developments in services for carers at this time. In that context, rather than publishing a document which does not include any significant plans for the future, the Government has decided not to publish a strategy at this time.

The Government is acutely aware of the sacrifices made by the many people who care for others and has sought to make many improvements in services and supports for carers. Over the past decade weekly payment rates to carers have greatly increased, qualifying conditions for carer's allowance have significantly eased, coverage of the scheme has been extended and new schemes such as carer's benefit and the respite care grant have been introduced and extended.

I appreciate that it is disappointing for carers and the people for whom they care that we are not in a position to publish a strategy at this time. I met with some of their representatives earlier this week to inform them of this difficult decision taken by Government.

I also wanted to acknowledge all those who took the time to make submissions as part of the public consultation process and to assure them that those submissions were considered in detail by the working group and will inform our thinking in the future. The Department of Social and Family Affairs and the Department of Health and Children, including the Health Service Executive, are committed to working with the carer representative groups to deliver services in a more effective way to support the carer groups in the valuable work they do in supporting carers.