Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)
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536. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if he will list the countries with which Ireland has reciprocal agreements regarding social insurance contributions for pensions and other core welfare payments; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [57350/25]

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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In addition to the 27 Member States of the EU, and the Convention on Social Security with the UK, Ireland currently has Bilateral Social Security Agreements (agreements) with Australia, Austria, Canada, Japan, Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Quebec, the Swiss Confederation, the United Kingdom and the United States. The agreements are limited to certain social welfare benefits and are predominantly pension related.

The main purpose of the agreements is to protect the pension rights of people who have worked and paid social security contributions in Ireland and the countries with which Ireland has social security agreements. This is achieved by allowing reckonable social security contributions paid in one or more of these countries to be aggregated with Irish full-rate social insurance contributions for the purposes of qualifying for certain contributory payments in Ireland or in these countries.