Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Question 107: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the discussions she has had with the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government regarding a faster transfer of applicants from rent supplement to the rental accommodation scheme. [8909/10]

Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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Question 110: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the number of persons claiming rent supplement for more than 18 months; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [8984/10]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 107 and 110 together.

The purpose of the rent supplement scheme is to provide short-term support to eligible people living in private rented accommodation whose means are insufficient to meet their accommodation costs and who do not have accommodation available to them from any other source. The overall aim is to provide short term assistance, and not to act as an alternative to the other social housing schemes operated by the Exchequer.

There are currently almost 93,200 tenants benefiting from a rent supplement payment - an increase of 55 per cent since the end of 2005. Over half of these recipients have been in payment for more than one year, while over 33,000 have been in payment for 18 months or more.

The rental accommodation scheme (RAS), which was introduced in 2004, gives local authorities specific responsibility for meeting the longer term housing needs of people receiving rent supplement for 18 months or more. Details of these cases are notified regularly by the Department to the local authorities. Local authorities meet the housing needs of these individuals through a range of approaches including the traditional range of social housing options, the voluntary housing sector and, in particular, the RAS.

Latest figures from the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government indicate that to date, local authorities have transferred over 13,400 rent supplement cases to the RAS while a total of over 24,800 transfers from rent supplement has occurred since 2005 : housing authorities have also transferred a further 11,413 recipients to other social housing options.

It is accepted that progress in relation to RAS was initially slower than expected. However the pace of delivery has improved significantly. In total, 14,000 recipients were transferred in 2008 and 2009; achieving targets the set for RAS transfers for these years. The target established for 2010 is 8,000.

In addition to this official target, due to the numbers of unsold affordable stock around the country, an opportunity has arisen to make use of some of these properties for RAS and it is expected that additional transfers may be possible in 2010.

The Department continues to work closely with the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government in ensuring that the RAS meets its objective of catering for those on long term rent supplementation while enabling rent supplement to return to its original role of a short-term income support. The Department provides regular reports to the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and regular meetings are conducted with the RAS program managers of the various local authorities.