asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he is aware that women, who have more domestic stamps than non-domestic stamps, are debarred from drawing unemployment benefit, and, if so, if he will take such steps as are necessary to have this restriction removed.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Women's Unemployment Benefits.
The statutory condition to which the Deputy refers is designed to confine payment of unemployment benefit to persons who mainly engage in work of a kind which is insurable against unemployment and in respect of which insurance contributions at the full rate are payable. Domestic service is not employment of that category and the provision does not appear to be unreasonable.
Is the Minister aware that under the present system a woman, who works as a domestic servant for 20 weeks in the year and signs for the remainder, can draw unemployment benefit for the rest of that year, while the woman who works for 20 weeks at non-domestic employment and 26 weeks at domestic work cannot draw for the other six weeks — cannot draw at all?
The position, as the Deputy states it, is not entirely correct. There are other means by which the person the Deputy has in mind can qualify for the payment of unemployment benefits. There are three ways in which she could qualify even though she has a smaller number of domestic stamps in any one year. If, say, an insured woman applied for unemployment benefit this year, and on her contributions she had a lesser number of full cost stamps, she could then turn to the two years previous, and if in the two years previous half the number of contributions she had paid were at the full rate she could qualify for the payment of unemployment benefits; if, say, she were not insured in the last two years but she were insured since the 5th July, 1954, and half the contributions paid were stamps at the full rate, she could also qualify for unemployment benefit and if her entry into insurance occurred since the 5th July, 1953, and again if half of her contributions were at the full rate she also would qualify.
Surely the Minister will agree that the three methods by which she can qualify are a repetition of the method by which she can qualify in any one year?
That is wrong.
Is it not a fact that if a woman, in three successive years, has more domestic stamps than non-domestic stamps — and there are quite a number of these — she cannot qualify?
The Deputy is not entirely correct. I must confess it is rather difficult to explain by question and answer, but the Deputy will appreciate that it certainly would not be in accordance with the Act or the spirit of the Act if full benefits were payable to a person who had contributed to the extent of 1/3 per week instead of at the full rate.
Is it not a fact that farm workers who contribute at the same rate will qualify?