Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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38. To ask the Minister for Social Protection her views on a complaint regarding the treatment of people collecting benefits (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [6257/15]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The Intreo Centre in Parnell Street caters for well in excess of 10,000 clients, many of whom have regular engagements of various types with the office. In the context of such a large clientele, the amount of complaints received concerning the office is minimal. The most recent statistics available show that in the last 3 months there has been less than 10 complaints received via the complaints procedure on the Department’s website in relation to the office. Additionally an even smaller number of individual complaints have been made in writing.

In relation to the nature of the complaints, only 2 of these concerned difficulties that clients experienced with regard to the manner in which they were dealt with in the office. These are being handled by directly contacting the clients concerned. The other issues raised, which include calculation of overpayments and reasons for decisions made, are also being handled currently or have been resolved.

There are currently 12 clients required to attend the office to sign on a daily basis. The option to request a client to sign daily can be taken in certain circumstances. Such circumstances can be when a client has a record of persistently signing late, an officer has formed the opinion that there a strong likelihood that a client may be currently in employment in the black economy, or a Deciding Officer is of the opinion that a client is not making sufficient efforts to seek employment or to avail of training opportunities. In most cases daily signing is supplemented by frequent interviews monitoring a client’s progress in seeking employment and/or training. The success rate of this approach is high; the majority of clients required to sign daily will avail of one of the Department’s Labour Activation measures within a short timeframe.