Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail)
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238. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the estimated full-year cost of child benefit in 2017; the estimated cost of providing a once-off double payment for all children born in 2017; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15162/17]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Child Benefit is a monthly payment made to families with children in respect of all qualified children up to the age of 16 years. The payment continues to be paid in respect of children up to their 18th birthday who are in full-time education, or who have a disability.

Child Benefit is currently paid to around 627,000 families in respect of some 1.2 million children, with an estimated expenditure in the order of over €2 billion in 2017.

As we are only in the first quarter of 2017 it is not possible to accurately predict how many children will be born in 2017. However, utilising current Child Benefit data as a proxy the estimated cost of providing a once off extra payment of €140 per child in addition to the normal annual Child Benefit entitlement would be in the region of €8 million. It is important to note that this figure is calculated using the current number of children in receipt of child benefit who have not yet reached their first birthday as a proxy for all children born in 2017.

Providing a once off double payment all children born in 2017 would not be a targeted approach given the universality of Child Benefit and would have to be considered in an overall budgetary context.