Eoghan Murphy (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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Question 352: To ask the Minister for Social Protection if any steps are in place to review the personal public service system in view of the discrepancy between the quantity of personal public service numbers in circulation and population figures. [22125/11]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The two sets of figures referred to by the Deputy are not directly comparable, as one refers to the numbers issued since 1979 and the other refers to the current population. In that context, there is no discrepancy.

The Department of Social Protection is responsible for maintaining the national database of Personal Public Service (PPS) numbers which are stored on the Department's Central Records System (CRS). There are currently 7.4 million customer records on CRS each of which is identified by a unique PPS number. The PPS number in its current format was originally a tax reference number. With the introduction of Pay Related Social Insurance (PRSI) in 1979 an individual's PAY AS You Earn (PAYE) tax reference number became known as a Revenue and Social Insurance (RSI) number. The RSI number was re-named the Personal Public Service (PPS) number in 1998 to reflect its future use as a unique identifier across the wider public service.

CRS is a complete database of all the historical tax reference numbers which were used to pre-populate the database in 1979 and every PPS number which has been issued since then. In addition to those persons currently resident in the State who have been issued with a PPS Number, the figure of 7.4 million also includes any individual who, since 1979, required a PPS number and;

1) has died,

2) has been resident in the State and has subsequently left the jurisdiction,

and

3) has not been resident in the State (e.g. an individual resident abroad who

has benefited from an Irish Estate – the Revenue Commissioners have a

requirement that all beneficiaries of Irish Estates should have a PPS

number)

The Department is continuously monitoring customer records on its CRS in order to preserve and enhance the quality of the data including, where appropriate, consolidating duplicate PPS numbers as they emerge.