Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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331. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the number of qualified social welfare recipients that will benefit from the October bonus and Christmas bonus announced in Budget 2025, by county, in tabular form. [40152/24]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The October bonus and Christmas bonus will benefit approximately 1.38 million social welfare recipients. An estimated breakdown of recipients by county requested by the Deputy is shown in the attached tabular statement.

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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332. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the number of school children now eligible for the scheme, from the further extension of hot meals announced in Budget 2025, by county, in tabular form. [40154/24]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Hot School Meals Programme has grown from a small pilot project to a nationwide programme now approved in 2,200 primary schools nationwide.

In April 2024, my Department contacted the remaining 1,000 primary schools, including the school referred to by the Deputy, who have not yet joined the Hot School Meals scheme, asking them if they wished to submit an expression of interest in commencing the provision of Hot School Meals. I can confirm that over 600 schools expressed an interest in joining the scheme as of end of September, I expect more schools to apply on an ongoing basis up to the end of this year.

As announced in Budget 2025, the Hot School Meals Scheme will be extended to all remaining primary schools in 2025. This announcement now means that in total, approximately 3,200 schools and 550,000 children are now eligible for the Hot School Meals Scheme in 2025. The expansion of the Hot School Meals Scheme will increase the School Meals budget by just over €72m to an overall budget of €288m. The number of schools now eligible for the Hot Meals Scheme in 2025, by county, is contained in the attached tabular statement.

I am very proud to have grown the Hot School Meals Programme from a small pilot project of just 30 schools to universal provision in all primary schools in 2025.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.

Tabular Statement – Schools eligible for Hot School Meals, from the further extension announced in Budget 2025, by county.