Tom Neville (Limerick County, Fine Gael)
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639. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her plans to expand the free travel scheme to recipients of domiciliary care; the estimated cost of this expansion; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [7054/18]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The current free travel scheme provides free travel on the main public and private transport services for those eligible under the scheme. These include road, rail and ferry services provided by companies such as Bus Átha Cliath, Bus Éireann and Iarnród Éireann, as well as Luas and services provided by almost 80 private transport operators. There are currently approximately 902,000 customers with direct eligibility to free travel with an annual allocation of €90 million. The scheme is available to all people aged over 66 living permanently in the State. To qualify for the scheme, applicants who are under age 66 must be in receipt of a qualifying payment. These 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.

Domiciliary care allowance is a monthly payment of €309.50 to the carer of a child with a disability. The allowance may be used for the additional costs involved in caring for the child and this may include additional transport costs.

There are currently 35,759 recipients of domiciliary care allowance. Of that number, 17,938 are also in receipt of carers allowance and therefore would already have a free travel pass. To provide the remaining 17,821 with a free travel pass might be expected to cost in the region of €1.8 million a year.

Any decision to extend the free travel scheme to all children that are in receipt of a domiciliary care allowance would require additional funding for the free travel scheme and would have to be considered in the context of overall budgetary negotiations.

Under the supplementary welfare allowance scheme (SWA) the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection may award a travel supplement in any case where the circumstances of the case so warrant. The supplement is intended to assist with ongoing or recurring travel costs that cannot be met from the client’s own resources and are deemed to be necessary. Every decision is based on consideration of the circumstances of the case, taking account of the nature and extent of the need and of the resources of the person concerned.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.