Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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687. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the status of progress towards the programme for Government commitment to review the fish assist scheme in recognition of the irregular earning patterns of fishermen. [53985/17]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The farm/fish assist schemes provide support for farmers and fishermen on low incomes and are similar to jobseeker’s allowance. Recipients retain the advantages of the jobseeker’s allowance scheme such as the retention of secondary benefits and access to activation programmes. The 2017 Revised Estimates for my Department provide for expenditure of €82.8 million on the farm/fish assist scheme.

The Programme for Government contained a commitment to undertake a review of “the Fish Assist scheme in recognition of the irregular earning patterns of fishermen, in an effort to respond to difficult financial circumstances.”

This review was completed in 2016 and informed the measures introduced for the Farm and Fish Assist Schemes in Budget 2017.

Budget 2017 introduced measures in relation to the assessment of means for farm/fish assist which reversed all changes introduced in Budgets 2012 and 2013. These measures included that farm/fish income would be assessed at 70% (down from 100%) with an additional annual means disregard of €254 for each of the first two children and €381 for the third and subsequent children. These improvements came into effect in March 2017.

Farm/fish assist recipients will also benefit from the following measures which I provided for in Budget 2018; the €5 per week increase in the maximum weekly rates of payment, proportionate increases in weekly payments for qualified adults, a €2 per week increase for each qualified child; the 85% Christmas Bonus. These changes are being introduced by the Social Welfare (Budget) Bill 2017 and will take effect from 26 March 2018. In addition, farm/fish assist recipients are eligible to avail of the 250 additional places on the Rural Social Scheme which I announced as part of the Budget 2018 package.