Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein)
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Question 15: To ask the Minister for Social Protection her views that the refusal to count credited contributions accrued while on maternity leave when calculating a person's eligibility for carer's benefit serves disadvantage and discriminates against women. [29055/11]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Carer's benefit is a payment for people who have made social insurance contributions and are planning to leave or have recently left the workforce to care for somebody who needs full-time care and attention. It is paid for two years for each person cared for and can be claimed in a single continuous period or in separate periods adding up to a total of two years. The scheme operates in conjunction with the Carer's Leave Act, 2001 which ensures the protection of the person's employment rights during an absence on Carer's Leave.

The scheme is particularly targeted at those people who have to leave paid employment to care. In addition to the conditions regarding full-time care, there are two main qualifying conditions in relation to employment and PRSI contributions which must be satisfied in order to qualify for the scheme. These qualifying conditions are in place to ensure that recipients of the scheme have a reasonable recent attachment to the workforce.

The first condition is that the person must have been employed for at least 16 hours per week for 8 weeks in the 26 week period immediately before claiming carer's benefit. Persons who have been on maternity, annual, adoptive, parental or term-time leave immediately prior to becoming a carer are eligible for carer's benefit. The leave period is disregarded so that the 26 week period to be assessed (to find 8 weeks of remunerative full-time insurable employment, whether consecutive or not) is the period prior to that leave.

Secondly the person must satisfy the PRSI contribution conditions. For carer's benefit only paid contributions are counted when determining eligibility for the scheme. The carer must have 156 PRSI contributions paid since entry into insurable employment and either 39 contributions in the relevant tax year or 39 contributions paid in the 12 months immediately before the commencement of the carer's benefit claim or 26 contributions paid in the 'relevant tax year' and 26 contributions paid in the tax year prior to that. The 'relevant tax year' is the second last complete tax year before the year in which the benefit is claimed; for claims made in 2011, the relevant tax year is 2009.

While it is the case that credited contributions accrued on maternity leave do not count towards the PRSI contribution condition for carer's benefit, the period of this leave is disregarded for the purposes of the employment condition. A person will be awarded credits while in receipt of carer's benefit in order to protect their social insurance record and these credits may help them to qualify for future social welfare payments.

A person who is not entitled to carer's benefit can apply for carer's allowance which is a means-tested payment for people looking after certain people in need of full-time care and attention. A person caring on a full-time basis can also apply for a respite care grant which is an annual payment of €1,700 made regardless of the carer's means.