John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein)
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402. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the estimated cost of extending the free travel scheme to include young persons in receipt of domiciliary care allowance; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21194/16]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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There are currently approximately 853,000 people in Ireland in receipt of free travel at an annual cost of €80 million per annum.

The free travel scheme is available to all people aged over 66 living permanently in the State. Applicants who are under age 66, including those with learning disabilities, must be in receipt of a qualifying payment in order to qualify for the scheme. The qualifying payments for those aged under 66 are invalidity pension, blind pension, disability allowance, carer’s allowance or an equivalent social security payment from a country covered by EC Regulations or one with which Ireland has a Bilateral Social Security Agreement. Free travel is provided for people in receipt of carer’s allowance to facilitate their caring role and support their social inclusion.

Allocation of funding for free travel is not based on the numbers on each qualifying scheme but on expected passenger numbers who avail of their free travel pass. Payments are calculated on the basis of fares foregone at a reduced rate to take account of travel generated by the free travel scheme and as such it would be very difficult to accurately give an estimated cost of extending the free travel scheme to include young persons in receipt of Domiciliary Care Allowance, particularly as such fares are generally reduced already by the service provider.

Any decision to extend the free travel scheme to persons who are not in receipt of a primary qualifying payment would have to be considered in the context of overall budgetary negotiations.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.