Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein)
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Question 51: To ask the Minister for Social Protection if there has been any increase in the number of applications for exceptional or emergency needs payments; if so, the scale of same; and if she will make additional funds available for administration by community welfare officers in the view of cuts to social welfare payments made by budget 2012. [11875/12]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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It should be noted that Budget 2012 did not impose any cuts to primary social welfare payments. Under the supplementary welfare allowance (SWA) scheme, the Department may make a single payment to help meet essential, once-off, exceptional expenditure, which a person could not reasonably be expected to meet out of their weekly income. These exceptional needs (ENP) payments are a vital component of the SWA scheme and link the income support function of the scheme with the wider welfare role of the Department's community welfare service.

There is no automatic entitlement to a payment. ENPs are payable at the discretion of the officers administering the scheme taking into account the requirements of the legislation and all the relevant circumstances of the case in order to ensure that the payments target those most in need of assistance. An analysis of payments made in the first eight weeks of 2012 over 2011 shows that during this period a total of 33,800 ENP payments at a cost of €8.6m were made while in the corresponding period in 2011 a total of 38,600 payments were made at a cost of €10.6m. This represents a 12% reduction in the number of payments. There are no plans to make additional funds available.