Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent)
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35. To ask the Minister for Social Protection her views on extending the period where a family can claim domiciliary care allowance for a child to 18 years rather than them going onto disability allowance at 16, as is currently the case; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [47095/14]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The Deputy will be aware that I commissioned two reports relating to the Domiciliary Care Allowance (DCA) scheme during 2012. One of these reports dealt specifically with the relationship between DCA and disability allowance (DA) for young adults. A proposal to extend the age limit for receipt of DCA to 18 years of age was made as a recommendation in both of these reports, which were published in April 2013.

The reports found that there was a strong rationale for raising the DCA age threshold to 18 years. The recommendation is that this change should be made from a specific date, with the age threshold for payment of DCA to increase to age 18 for all new and existing claimants aged 16 and under on that date. On this same date the age threshold for payment of DA would change to age 18, to apply to new claimants only.

However, the Deputy will be aware that there are differing views on the best way to proceed so as to provide support to the group of people in question. While the recommendations of the reports will be kept under consideration as part of ongoing review of the wider disability area, there are no plans to extend the age limit for receipt of DCA at this time.