Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Government acknowledges the valuable role that family carers play and is fully committed to supporting carers in that role. This commitment is recognised in both the Programme for Government and the National Carers’ Strategy. This cross-departmental strategy is led by the Department of Health.

The main income supports to carers provided by my department are Carer’s Allowance, Carer’s Benefit, Domiciliary Care Allowance and the Carer’s Support Grant. Spending on these payments is expected to amount to over €1.7 billion this year.

I have taken a range of actions to improve supports for carers over recent years through increasing payment rates and income disregards and once-off and extra double payments.

I have taken this approach again as part of Budget 2024 and announced the following measures that carers will benefit from:

• In November a €400 a lump sum was paid to people receiving the Carer's Support Grant.
• A Christmas Bonus Double Payment was paid to people in receipt of Carer's Allowance and Carer’s Benefit.
• There was a proportionate payment, to the value of one week, paid to those in receipt of the monthly Domiciliary Care payment.
• January also saw an increase of €10 per month to the Domiciliary Care Allowance payment bringing it to €340 per month.
• In addition, there was a €12 increase to weekly Carers Allowance and Carers Benefit payments.
• From the week commencing 29 January, I made another once-off double Cost of Living Support Payment which was paid to qualifying Social Protection recipients including all pensioners, carers and people on long-term disability payments.
• From June, there will be an increase the earnings disregard for Carer's Allowance from €350 to €450 for a single person and from €750 to €900 for a couple.

I trust the above provides a comprehensive update on the various supports to carers. I will continue to keep the range of supports available to carers under review, in consultation with family carers and their representative organisations.