Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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53. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her views on permanently increasing both child benefit and qualified child payments in Budget 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37524/24]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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272. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if she supports permanently increasing both child benefit and qualified child payments in Budget 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37620/24]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 53 and 272 together.

Child Benefit is a monthly payment made to families with children up to the age of 16 years. The payment continues to be paid in respect of children until their 19th birthday where they are in full-time education or have a disability. The extension of Child Benefit to 18 year olds was one of my key priorities in Budget 2024 and I am very pleased that we were able to bring that change in from May this year.

Child Benefit is paid at €140 per month. Twins are paid at one and a half times the standard monthly rate for each child, that is, €210 per month for each twin. All other multiple births are paid at double the standard monthly rate for each child, that is €280 per child.

Child Benefit is currently in payment to approximately 677,000 families in respect of approximately 1.2 million children with an estimated expenditure of €2.2 billion for 2024.

Most weekly social welfare payments also include provision for an additional payment - an Increase for a Qualified Child in respect of each qualified child up to the age of 18, or age 22 in certain circumstances. This is one of a number of measures which provide targeted support to low-income families.

Following increases in previous Budgets, in Budget 2024, I increased the weekly Increase for a Qualified Child rates by €4 to €46 per child for under 12s and to €54 per week for those aged 12 and over. As a result, these rates are now 35.3% and 45.9% higher respectively compared to the rates in 2019 when a higher rate for those aged 12 and over was introduced.

Social welfare payments, including Child Benefit and the Increase for a Qualified Child are kept under review in the context of the annual Budget.

I trust this clarifies matters for the Deputy.