Vol. 384 No. 5
asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he has any plans to eliminate the anomaly which exists whereby a person in receipt of old age or widow's pension does not qualify for a free fuel allowance if a son/daughter resides with them who are equally in receipt of long-term unemployment assistance; if his attention has been drawn to the fact that this category also do not qualify; if he has any plans to review this situation; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
14.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare the circumstances under which a person with a family drawing unemployment assistance can qualify for free fuel vouchers; and if an income limit applies in these cases.
16.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will give details of the national fuel scheme which is now in operation; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
20.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will amend the current fuel regulations in order to allow recipients of long-term unemployment assistance to receive free fuel while they reside with other persons who are also in receipt of long-term unemployment assistance.
29.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare if his attention has been drawn to the widespread dissatisfaction with the new national fuel scheme as a result of its many anomalies, such as the fact that an old age pensioner living with a son or daughter on long-term unemployment assistance is excluded or that two long-term unemployment assistance recipients living together are excluded; if he intends to take any action to remove these anomalies; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
32.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare the steps he intends to take to remove the anomalies in the revised national fuel scheme whereby many people in similar or worse circumstances than those who are entitled to free fuel are being denied payment.
34.
asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will give details of the manner of operation of the national fuel scheme with the particulars of the Acts of the Oireachtas and Regulations under which it operates; the criteria laid down by his Department for the granting of the fuel allowance under the national fuel scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 13, 14, 16, 20, 29, 32 and 34 together.
The national fuel scheme is a non-statutory scheme. Fuel allowances under the national fuel scheme are paid to recipients of long-term social welfare and health board payments who are living alone or only with excepted persons and who satisfy the Department or the health boards that they are unable to provide for their own heating needs. The scheme operates for 26 weeks from 17 October 1988 to 14 April 1989 and the fuel allowance payable is £5 per week.
A new information leaflet, SW 29, which explains in more detail what the national fuel scheme is about, has been issued to all the Department's information and local offices in addition to health centres and post offices. Copies were also made available to the Oireachtas Library.
Prior to 1987 there were two types of fuel schemes, namely, the urban fuel schemes administered by local authorities with automatic entitlements to fuel allowances for certain persons living in a number of towns and cities, mainly along the eastern and southern coastlines, and the national scheme which was operated by the health boards throughout the whole country and subject to a means test and stated eligibility conditions. The fact that there were two separate fuel schemes with different conditions for entitlement was unsatisfactory and highly inequitable.
The question of standardising of the fuel schemes had been raised on a number of occasions and commitments had been given by previous Ministers to introduce one scheme. No progress was made however until 1987 when the Government decided to proceed with standardisation on a phased basis. The first step we took was to extend the scheme on a nationwide basis to 30,000 persons on long-term unemployment assistance living alone or with dependants. The second step was to set up one scheme throughout the country under unified administration and subject to the proviso that any existing entitlements would be preserved. This has now been achieved and under the new arrangements all beneficiaries will henceforth have their entitlement to fuel allowances determined and paid in the same way as their qualifying payments. Thus, the Department caters for the entitlement of pensioners, the Department's local offices cater for the long term unemployed and the health boards look after the needs of beneficiaries under schemes they administer, namely, supplementary welfare allowance, disabled person's maintenance allowance and infectious diseases maintenance allowance. The health boards also cater for payments for fuel to people with special heating needs by reason of ill-health.
Under the new arrangements pensioners qualify for a fuel allowance under essentially the same conditions as applied under the scheme previously administered by the health boards. Persons in receipt of the long term rate of unemployment assistance are entitled to a fuel allowance provided that they live either alone or with a qualified dependant only. A qualified dependant for this purpose is a person in respect of whom an adult or child dependant allowance is payable with the unemployment assistance.
The conditions which apply in the case of unemployment assistance recipients are more restrictive than those which apply to pensioners in that in the case of unemployment assistance no allowance is payable where a person other than a qualified dependant is residing with the claimant. In the case of pensioners, however, an allowance is payable even if another pensioner is in residence. The extension of the scheme to unemployment assistance recipients brings in an additional 30,000 people and I regard this as a major achievement. I will be reviewing the operation of the scheme at the end of the present heating season and any changes considered necessary will be made in time for the following heating season.
