Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

139. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the estimated full-year cost of reinstating a concurrent payment of half-rate illness benefit and jobseeker’s benefit in addition to one parent family payment and widow’s and widower’s pensions. [25695/20]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Until 2012, recipients of a Widow's or Widower's Pension or a One-Parent Family Payment who met all the qualifying conditions for Jobseeker's Benefit or Illness Benefit, were entitled to concurrently claim half the normal rate of Jobseeker's or Illness Benefit.

When the concurrent payment of half-rate Illness Benefit and Jobseeker's Benefit, in addition to One-Parent Family Payment and Widow's and Widower's Pensions, was abolished in Budget 2012, this produced a saving of €22.6 million in a full year.

I am advised that the Department is not immediately in a position to determine how much it would cost to reintroduce this, as it is not known how many lone parents, jobseekers, widows, widowers or surviving civil partners recipients would also qualify for Jobseeker's Benefit or Illness Benefit and as such be entitled to concurrent half-rate payments.