Tom Fleming (Kerry South, Independent)
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148. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she will maintain the funding for farm assist in the forthcoming budget; if she will restore income and child disregards to their pre-budget 2013 levels and assess the means test on the current income position rather than on a historical 12 month basis; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [34446/14]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Farm Assist is a means-tested income support scheme for farmers. To qualify for Farm Assist, a person must be a farmer, farming land in the State, aged between 18 and 66 and satisfy a means test. There were just over 10,300 recipients of farm assist at end December last and nearly €99.5 million was spent on the scheme in 2013.

The farm assist scheme is based on jobseeker’s allowance and was introduced in 1999 to replace ‘Smallholders Unemployment Assistance’ for low income farmers. Farm assist recipients retain all the advantages of the jobseeker’s allowance scheme such as retention of secondary benefits and access to activation programmes.

Recent changes to the scheme have brought it into closer alignment with the jobseeker’s allowance scheme’s treatment of self-employed persons.

The assessment of means for the purpose of qualifying for farm assist is designed to reflect the actual net income from farming. Income and expenditure figures for the preceding year are generally used as an indicator of the expected position in the following year. However, account is taken of any exceptional circumstances so as to ensure that the assessment accurately reflects the current situation.

Farm assist is a flexible payment and any farmer experiencing lower levels of income or cash-flow issues can ask his/her local social welfare/Intreo office to review the level of means applying to their claim.

The scheme, including the recent changes, is kept under review. Any changes to the scheme would be a matter for Government to consider in a budgetary context.