asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will take steps to vary the regulations whereby an applicant for unemployment benefit who is deemed to have a income of £2 weekly is debarred from such benefit.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Unemployment Benefit Regulations.
14.
The Regulations to which the Deputy refers are contained in Article 7 (b) (ii) of the Social Welfare Regulations, 1953 (S.I. No. 7 of 1953), as amended by Article 3 of the Social Welfare Regulations, 1962 (S.I. No. 135 of 1962). These articles provide that a day shall not be treated as a day of unemployment if an insured person is on that day following any occupation from which he derives any remuneration or profit unless such occupation could ordinarily have been followed by him in addition to his usual employment and outside the ordinary working hours of that employment and the remuneration or profit therefrom for such day does not exceed six shillings and eightpence, or, where the remuneration or profit is in respect of a period longer than a day, such remuneration or profit does not on the daily average exceed that amount.
These provisions are designed to ensure that unemployment benefit becomes payable only to those insured persons who are genuinely unemployed and available for any full-time wage-earning employment that offers. The provisions are necessary for the protection of the Social Insurance Fund against undue encroachment by insured persons who have more than one occupation.
Would the Minister not go further and repeat what he promised the House yesterday, that he had this regulation under examination with a view to "upping" the amount of 6/8d. per day?
I said I am considering that, but I would not expect that it would be increased by any very significant amount.
In his reply today, the Minister has not indicated that he is considering it.
I am considering it.
Surely the Minister will agree that if a single man can earn up to 6/8d. a day and still draw unemployment benefit, the married man with a wife and 11 children should not be debarred from drawing unemployment benefit because he earns 6/8d.?
This is not a question of a means test; it is a question of the definition as to whether or not the man is in fact unemployed.
In operation, it is most unfair.
You can qualify for 26 weeks unemployment benefit by obtaining insurable employment for 26 weeks and if a fairly substantial farmer were enabled, by a short period of insurable employment, to qualify for benefit to the extent of £7 14s. 6d. a week, the incentive to return to work in Dublin from Meath would not be very strong.
Surely the Minister is aware that he requires more than 26 weeks employment? He has to have a certain number of stamps also in the qualifying year, which is the previous year, and in fact it must be proved that the man has worked at least for a considerable time over 26 weeks. Any man who leaves home at seven o'clock in the morning and travels 40 miles to work must need the job.
Surely it is not an incentive to a man to look for work if he works for two or three hours a day and gets 6/8d for the work and is deprived of 13/4d. as, in the case of the man with the 11 children?
It is not 13/4. The appropriate benefit in that case would be £7. 14. 6d. but this is a case of a man who in fact is not unemployed because he has a farm of an economic size.
It is not economic according to the Minister for Lands.
If it was possible for such a man to qualify like that by a short period of work then, as I say, the temptation for people to look upon unemployment benefit as a means of supplementing their incomes would be fairly strong and make the provision of adequate insurance cover for genuine employed workers much more expensive.
Surely it is a deterrent to a man who is offered two hours work for which he gets 6/8d. He will not work for 6/8d. because if he does he will lose something like 24/-.
That is a very exceptional case.
It is not.
Will the Minister not agree that this was not in force until January, 1963 and is he not aware that it mainly hits small farmers and shopkeepers who might be entitled to benefit of £5, £6, or £7 per week from the contributions they pay to his Department, and they are deprived of that because the Minister's officials state that the family income from the business or small farm is more than £2 a week? Surely he will agree that at present day money values that is a most unjust imposition on these applicants?
This regulation was always there.
It was never enforced.
In fact, the amount was raised to 6/8 in 1962. That is the only change there has been. It has been administered liberally.
As contributions are now 11/10 a week and as these applicants cannot benefit from the contributions, will the Minister exempt them from paying such contributions when they get employment in the future, say, from county councils or other employers?
No. I do not think it would be justifiable because, as I explained to Deputy Tully yesterday, that would make it more attractive to employers to employ people such as farmers in preference to people who have no other occupation.
Will the Minister consider——
Question No. 15.
Excuse me; I have asked only two supplementary questions.
There have been 12.
I know. Will the Minister consider varying this figure forthwith and, instead of £2, put down at least £5—to replace the £2 by at least £5?
What £2?
Two pounds weekly.
In any case, I told Deputy Tully yesterday that I was considering whether or not the amount should be raised. I should point out that the figure we have here of 6/8d. is the same as the figure in Great Britain.