Vol. 428 No. 3
10 Mr. Creed asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will instruct health boards throughout the country to make assistance available under the supplementary welfare allowance scheme to the occupiers of local authority houses who are having difficulties with repayments under the tenant purchase scheme.
Under the supplementary welfare allowance scheme health boards may pay a weekly supplement towards rent or mortgage interest payments to persons whose means are insufficient to meet their needs. A payment towards mortgage interest may be granted where the interest exceeds £5 per week.
Where a local authority tenant has opted to buy his own home under a tennant purchase scheme he will normally have the option to revert to tenancy should he encounter difficulties in making repayments. Tenant purchasers who seek assistance from the health boards are advised to contact the relevant local authority with a view to renegotiating the terms of their agreements or reverting to tenancy.
An interdepartmental working group, of officials from my Department and from the Department of the Environment, has been set up to examine issues of concern to both Departments in relation to rent and mortgage supplementation. The position of tenant purchasers who encounter difficulties with their mortgage repayments is being addressed in the context of this review.
I am appalled at the Minister's response. Surrender and regrant is something that was associated with the Irish land policy under the Commonwealth. To have an Irish Minister in an Irish Government suggesting to tenants of local authority houses who have made huge efforts to own their own houses that they should forego all of the moneys which they have spent by way of repayment and revert to tenancy is an absolute disgrace. I would ask the Minister at this stage to direct local community welfare officers to make available to tenant purchasers the same assistance available to anybody else on a mortgage. Is there not something immoral about a State that can offer assistance to people who run into difficulties with £50,000, £60,000 and £100,000 mortgages but when people who buy their local authority houses run into trouble they will ask them to surrender their houses to the local authority and rent them back? It is appalling.
The Deputy has made his point.
I ask the Minister to withdraw the directive from his Department which has tied the hands of community welfare officers throughout the country.
This is the practice. If a person's house comes through the Department of the Environment, through the local authorities, that is the body with whom he has to deal if there is a difficulty with the rent.
They are not just paying rent but also a loan repayment.
If there is a difficulty, it is because they are dealing with an agency of the State. There is dissatisfaction with that situation. I did not create it; that is the way it is.
It was the Minister's directive which went out to the community welfare officers quite recently and the Minister knows that.
It did not.
Deputy Creed should not engage in argument.
The health boards will consult the Department of the Environment and the local authorities to ensure that the position of people in that situation is not adversely effected.
Will the Minister not agree that those who occupy local authority houses, having managed to enter into a rental purchase agreement, are very often on low incomes and sometimes, through no fault of their own, have ended up with no income other than social welfare? Is there not something totally immoral about a State that tells them——
We are having repetition.
The Minister has refused to address the central issue. The Department has issued a directive to community welfare officers to tell these people to surrender their houses and rent them back from the local authority. In conclusion, I wish to ask the Minister a simple question. Will he contact health boards and advise them to enable community welfare officers to make available to people who are on rental purchase schemes assistance with that part of their rental purchase that involves interest?
That assistance is available to anybody else who has a mortgage. If that action is not taken——
Please, Deputy, this question is too long.
——the Government will be discriminating in favour of those who have mortgages of £50,000, £60,000 or £100,000.
The Deputy is now seeking to debate the matter, which is clearly not in order. Let us have brevity.
I shall try to be brief.
I was not referring to the Minister.
People in local authority housing have an administrative arrangement with the local authority and the Department of the Environment. If there are administrative difficulties, there are means of dealing with those difficulties. The Deputy is asking for a different Department to enter into and participate in the policy of the Department of the Environment and to change arrangements that have been made. Substantial discounts apply only to local authority purchasers and not to other purchasers. Specific, separate arrangements apply for local authority purchasers and the local authority is in an administrative position to deal with difficulties that arise in that area. In effect, the Deputy is saying that the Department of Social Welfare should deal with all the difficulties of every other Department and that other Departments should be allowed to do what they like.
The social welfare system is the safety net.
Funny money in a serious matter.
The approach suggested by the Deputy would result in a huge number of problems. For example, if the ESB were not prepared to run a reasonable, rational, sensible programme the Department of Social Welfare would have to pay outstanding ESB bills, with the ESB not having to chase outstanding debtors or provide easy payment methods.
The Minister is being facetious.
The Department has heard that argument over the years. All difficulties could be passed on to the taxpayer through supplementary welfare assistance and the Department of Social Welfare. Each agency has its own——
It seems that everything is being passed on to the loan sharks.
I wish that the Deputy would let me answer. The Deputy left the Chamber to go and have his dinner and now that he has come back he is being disruptive.
On a point of clarification, a Cheann Comhairle, I have been in the House since 10.30 this morning. I left the Chamber to deal with my amendments to the Report Stage of the Social Welfare Bill. The Minister should not make assumptions.
The Deputy is just disrupting the discussion. I have said that an interdepartmental——
The Minister draws the guidelines.
The proper approach is being taken in that an interdepartmental group has set about examining that position. From there, an attempt will be made to rationalise the process.
The Minister should withdraw the circulars.
We shall now move on to Question No. 12.
In the meantime, local authority tenants are being forced to go back and rent their houses.
That should not be necessary.
The Minister should issue a directive to his community welfare officers that they give assistance.
Members are being very boisterous. I again call Question No. 12.
