Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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18. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if she will amend the eligibility criteria for the fuel allowance to take those with occupational pensions into account. [14856/22]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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To receive Fuel Allowance an applicant must be in receipt of a qualifying DSP payment, satisfy a means test and satisfy the household composition test.  This ensures that the Fuel Allowance payment goes to those who are more vulnerable to fuel poverty including those reliant on social protection payments for longer periods and those who are unlikely to have additional resources of their own. 

It should be noted that receipt of an occupational pension in itself does not debar an applicant from receiving Fuel Allowance.  If an applicant is in receipt of a qualifying payment and an occupational pension, the amount of occupational pension received will be included in the means test to determine whether the applicant will qualify for the Fuel Allowance payment.  In Budget 2022, I increased the weekly means threshold for the Fuel Allowance scheme by €20 to €120 above the appropriate rate of contributory State pension which enabled more people in receipt of occupational pensions to qualify for this support. 

Any decision to change the qualifying criteria for fuel allowance to exempt income from occupational pensions from the means test would have very significant budgetary consequences and would result in many better off families qualifying for the payment.  Such a decision could only be considered while taking account of the overall budgetary context and the core policy priority to direct scarce resources to those most in need.

Under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, support may be available to those in receipt of occupational pensions who are struggling with the cost of heating their homes.  Exceptional Needs Payments may be made to help meet an essential, once-off cost which customers are unable to meet out of their own resources, and this may include exceptional heating costs.  Decisions on such payments are made on a case-by-case basis.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.