Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein)
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71. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she has seen the content of the citizens information centre report on the centralised rent supplement units and the experience of applicants and recipients in dealing with them; when it will be published for public consumption; and the progress that has been made on its recommendations and findings. [52000/13]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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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. There are approximately 80,000 rent supplement recipients for which the Government has provided over €403 million for 2013.

It is assumed that the Deputy is referring to the report entitled “Centralised Rent Supplement Units: an evaluation of clients’ experiences” which was compiled following research by a number of Citizens Information Centres (CICs) in 2012 and launched in June 2013. This report is not a report published by the Department of Social Protection.

Citizens Information Services (CISs) provide a face-to-face service to the public in the provision of free, impartial and confidential information. They are supported and funded by the Citizens Information Board. Each CIS is an independent company, limited by guarantee and managed by Voluntary Boards of Management. They each cover a geographical area, either country-wide or part of an urban area, and deliver their services through a network of CICs.

I am aware of the contents of this report which was based on material collected between July 2012 and October 2012. The sample size of 55 respondents referred to in the report cannot be considered a representative sample of the over 13,500 claims that were maintained by the Department’s CRUs in Park West and Tallaght at that time, representing a sample size of some 0.4%. The report made a number of recommendations, a number of which are already in place.

Since the period of this research, the Department has made changes to the structure of these units to streamline the geographical areas that they cover. It has also introduced a number of changes and improvements to the operation of the CRUs, including the introduction of dedicated e-mail addresses and the introduction of a new streamlined rent application form in September 2012 which has resulted in an increase in completed applications at initial stage thereby improving the processing times.

The Department continues to keep the operational and organisational process of the CRUs under constant review with a view to managing operational efficiency and maximising service for the customer.