Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein)
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147. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the options available to persons for financial support towards housing while they are waiting for a housing needs assessment in view of the fact that they are now not entitled to rent allowance since the introduction of the new housing assistance payment system; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [44816/14]

Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein)
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156. To ask the Minister for Social Protection her plans to address the gaps in the new housing assistance payment system where a person is not entitled to receive a payment until a housing need assessment has been completed (details supplied); the options available to them; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [44909/14]

Kevin Humphreys (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 147 and 156 together.

The purpose of the rent supplement scheme is to provide short-term income support to assist with reasonable accommodation costs of eligible people living in private rented accommodation who are unable to provide for their accommodation costs from their own resources. The overall aim is to provide short term assistance, and not to act as an alternative to the other social housing schemes operated by the Exchequer. There are currently approximately 72,500 rent supplement recipients for which the Government has provided over €344 million for 2014.

It is a condition of rent supplement that a person must have been residing in private rented accommodation, or accommodation for homeless persons or an institution (or any combination of these) for a period of 183 days within the preceding 12 months of the date of claim for rent supplement. A person may also qualify for rent supplement where an assessment of housing need has been carried out and the person is deemed by a housing authority to be eligible for and in need of social housing support.

In all other cases, a person who wishes to apply for rent supplement is referred, in the first instance, for an assessment of eligibility for social housing support by the housing authority. Only when the person has been assessed as being eligible for and in need of social housing support does the person become eligible for consideration for rent supplement. There is no entitlement to rent supplement pending the completion of this assessment.

The conditions for rent supplement have changed following the introduction of the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) which has been introduced in Cork County, Limerick City & County and Waterford City & County from 15th September and was further extended to South Dublin, Kilkenny, Monaghan and Louth from 1st October 2014. In these areas, new applicants assessed as requiring social housing support will be considered for HAP rather than rent supplement. The applicant’s eligibility for social housing support, including HAP, will be assessed by the relevant local authority. Policy in relation to HAP is a matter for my colleague, the Minister for the Department of Environment, Community and Local Government.