Vol. 430 No. 6
70 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he proposes to change the system whereby the recipients of the family income supplement are not allowed to claim for new dependants until the review date of their present claim.
The current operation of family income supplement, FIS, is based on a payment which is reviewed every 52 weeks. This rule is considered to be in the best interests of providing a stable and continuous income to low earning workers with families while maintaining the administrative simplicity of the scheme.
A proposal to shorten the review period for family income supplement to allow for the speedier inclusion of newly qualified dependants in the assessment process would have the effect of enabling people to claim in respect of new dependants but would also disqualify recipients whose number of dependants has reduced.
In addition, the impact of a shorter review period and the more frequent means testing which this would involve could adversely affect the level of take-up of the scheme.
