Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)
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Question 164: To ask the Minister for Social Protection if he will respond to a query (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36938/10]

Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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Since April 2000 the needs of asylum seekers are catered for under the direct provision system operated by the Reception and Integration Agency of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. Under the system asylum seekers are provided with full board accommodation and other facilities such as laundry services and access to leisure areas. To take account of the services provided, a direct provision allowance of €19.10 per adult per week and €9.60 per child per week is payable in respect of any personal requisites required. The payment of this weekly direct provision allowance is being made on an administrative basis by the Community Welfare Division of the Health Service Executive on behalf of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform.

Under the supplementary welfare allowance scheme (SWA), which is administered on behalf of the Department by the community welfare division of the Health Service Executive, an exceptional needs payment may be made to help meet an essential, once-off cost which the applicant is unable to meet out of his/her own resources.

The principal consideration in making a single payment of SWA to address a particular need is that the need to be met must be 'exceptional'. Payments should arise only under abnormal conditions and should not become a regular or standard practice. Thus, an exceptional needs payment should be a single payment to meet an unforeseen and/or special need which cannot be met from a client's basic income.

Eligible people would normally be in receipt of a social welfare or HSE payment. There is no automatic entitlement to this payment. Each application is determined by the Executive based on the particular circumstances of the case, taking account of the nature and extent of the need. The expense incurred in emergency visits abroad or the purchasing of a car by foreign nationals or asylum seekers would not be considered appropriate to the exceptional needs payment provisions of the supplementary welfare allowance scheme.

The Department is aware that there have been reports from time to time that asylum seekers, refugees and foreign nationals are in receipt of special payments through the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme for certain items that would not be of an essential or exceptional nature. These reports are without foundation; insofar as it is possible to identify the individual cases about which the allegations were made, no such payments are, or have ever been made in this regard through the scheme or through any other social welfare support system.