asked the Minister for Social Welfare whether he has made an order excluding payment for Saturday for social welfare recipients of unemployment benefit; and if so, why this has been done.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Unemployment Benefit Payment.
51.
I have made no such order. The question whether Saturday or any other week-day is a day of unemployment for benefit purposes is a matter for determination by a statutory deciding officer or appeals officer on the facts and circumstances in each case.
Is the Minister aware that it has become standard practice for his Department to refuse payment to applicants who sign for benefit on Saturday, and that this was brought very much to the fore during the recent ESB dispute when shift workers who normally work on Saturday were all disallowed payment because his Department stated that Saturday was no longer a day for which payment was to be made? Would the Minister look into that?
There are usually three waiting days, and these were Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Saturday is not a day, in the case of a temporary cessation of work, on which the unemployed person can claim loss of employment, and the persons in question were paid in respect of Monday only, except in cases where I believe the employers paid anyhow.
Does the Minister not appreciate that the workers were working on shifts on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and had in fact qualified for the three days? They were therefore due payment for Saturday as a normal working day, but these people were disqualified from benefit under a regulation which the Minister said he did not make.
There is no fixed regulation. Each case is decided on its merits.
When this matter was brought to the notice of the Minister's Department, all that was received was an acknowledgement, and that is several weeks ago, and a decision has not yet been reached.
We have some appeals, in which some ESB workers were involved, pending in respect of Saturday. It is a question of whether they were normally employed on Saturday or not.
I am not talking about ESB workers; I am talking about shift workers out of work because of the ESB dispute. Surely the cost of the appeals will be far more to the State and to the taxpayer than the amount of money due to people who cannot afford to be without it? Would the Minister do something about this? It should be dealt with as a matter of commonsense.
We shall have an opportunity of deciding on these appeals.
Does that mean that a man with, say, six or seven children will have to wait until the appeals officer gets around to his appeal in six months time before he gets the pay due to him?
There are not many involved.
It is just as hard if there is only one individual.