Liz O'Donnell
Question:25 Ms O'Donnell asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will increase from £3 to £5 the free fuel allowance scheme to people who are residing in smokeless fuel areas. [3192/95]
Written Answers. - Social Welfare Benefits.
Dermot Ahern
Question:180 Mr. D. Ahern asked the Minister for Social Welfare the plans, if any, he has to make an increase available in the rate of payment on the fuel allowance scheme in view of the fact that the rate was not increased for some time; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3136/95]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 25 and 180 together.
The national fuel scheme assists householders who are on long term social welfare or health board payments and who are unable to provide for their own heating needs. A payment of £5 per week is paid to eligible households for 26 weeks, from mid-October to mid-April.
An additional smokeless fuel allowance of £3 per week, was introduced in October 1990, to assist people living in the built up areas of Dublin to help meet the additional costs arising from the ban on the sale of bituminous coal in these areas. This allowance has been extended to cover the Cork city and adjacent areas to coincide with the ban on the sale of bituminous coal which came into effect there on 13 February 1995. Payments will commence from week ending 17 February 1995.
At present, a contributory pensioner and members of his household, can have means of up to £5 a week in addition to the social welfare pension and qualify for the fuel allowance. In this week's budget I have increased this £5 means limit to £10 with effect from the start of the 1995-96 fuel scheme in October 1995.
Increases in the overall level of the fuel allowance and the smokeless fuel allowance would have significant financial implications. For example, an increase of £1 in the level of fuel allowance would cost approximately £7.3 million in a full heating season. The estimated cost of increasing the smokeless fuel allowance from £3 to £5 would be in the region of £5.5 million.
Noel Dempsey
Question:27 Mr. Dempsey asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will publish guidelines to family general practitioners outlining the way in which his Department deems a person to be incapacitated under the terms of the free telephone allowance scheme. [1322/95]
The free telephone rental allowance scheme is intended to safeguard elderly or incapacitated people living on limited means in circumstances where they would have nobody who could obtain help for them in an emergency.
The main qualifying conditions are that the applicants must be in receipt of a welfare-type pension and they must satisfy the living alone condition of the scheme. The living alone condition provides that the pensioner must be either living alone or only with certain excepted persons.
"Excepted persons" includes persons over 15 years of age who would be unable to obtain help for the pensioner in an emergency. If an applicant is living with such a person, he or she are required to get the person's doctor to complete Part 6 of the standard application form in respect of his patient. Part 6 of the application form includes questions regarding the nature and severity of the incapacity, the extent the patient is affected and the opinion of the certifying doctor on the ability of the patient to get help for the pensioner, if required, without the use of a telephone in the house. The questions are straightforward and there is no reason why a doctor should have any difficulty in answering them.
The final decision on the medical aspects relevant to a claim rests with the Department's own medical adviser. Part 6 of the application form includes a request to the certifying doctor that the certificate be as complete and accurate as possible in order that the Department's medical adviser can satisfy himself on the merits of the case. The system is considered to have operated satisfactorily since it was introduced in 1978. If any general practitioner has difficulties in the matter they should contact my Department where every assistance will be given.
Michael McDowell
Question:28 Mr. M. McDowell asked the Minister for Social Welfare if his attention has been drawn to the fact that a substantial amount of money is lost to the Exchequer each year because supplementary welfare allowance payments are made to people with no income pending actions in the courts for personal injuries in the absence of legal provision under the Social Welfare Acts for recovering this money, the taxpayer thus effectively subsidising insurance companies in respect of claims arising from other people's negligence. [3198/95]
Under existing provisions certain social insurance benefits are taken into account in assessing damages in personal injuries actions. Section 75 of the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Act, 1993 provides that disablement benefit or injury benefit payable in the five year period from the date of accrual of the cause of the action, be taken into account in assessing such damages.
Section 237 of the 1993 Act contains a similar provision in respect of disability benefit and invalidity pension. These arrangements are designed to ensure that people are not compensated twice for loss of earnings.
People who are involved in accidents and who have no entitlement to social welfare benefits can claim supplementary welfare allowance while they are unfit for work and pursuing compensation claims. There are no provisions in legislation which would allow supplementary welfare allowance paid in these circumstances to be taken into account in assessing compensation.
In 1990, an inter-ministerial study group on the question of reducing the costs of motor insurance concluded that changing the present arrangements to enable social welfare payments to be recovered from awards would increase insurance costs which would be likely to be passed on to the public. In addition, it was considered that gains could be outweighed by the cost of recovery from individual clients.
Notwithstanding these findings, I believe that this issue is one which merits re-examination and the matter is currently being reviewed by my Department.
Chris Flood
Question:29 Mr. Flood asked the Minister for Social Welfare the plans, if any, he has to introduce free rental for car cellular phones for disabled persons; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2622/95]
The free telephone rental allowance scheme administered by my Department is intended to provide an element of protection and security for pensioners or disabled persons with limited means, who are either living alone or only with persons who would be incapable of obtaining help for them in an emergency.
The allowance covers the rental for the standard telephone handset and a small number of free calls. Any additional expense incurred by the renter whether for extra calls or for additional facilities is not covered under the terms of the scheme.
In common with other schemes of this nature, the free telephone rental allowance scheme is reviewed from time to time with a view to changes that will improve the scheme and meet emerging needs. The Deputy's suggestion in relation to car cellular telephones will be borne in mind in that connection. I should mention that the allowance is currently paid to about 132,000 persons at an annual cost of about £23 million.
Ivor Callely
Question:30 Mr. Callely asked the Minister for Social Welfare the total amount of money received by his Department towards payment of social welfare benefits to spouses and dependants from liable relatives in 1994; the total number of such social welfare recipients and the total value of payments for that year; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3130/95]
The "Liability to Maintain Family" provisions in the Social Welfare Acts are based on the widely-accepted obligation on people to maintain their spouses and their children. Under the legislation, where a marriage breakdown occurs and a family is dependent on a social welfare payment, the person who is liable to maintain that family must contribute to my Department towards the cost of the family's income support.
A total of £259,803 has been collected in contributions from liable relatives in 1994 towards the cost of the payment of lone parents (separated spouses) allowance, deserted wife's allowance or deserted wife's benefit to their spouses. Liable relatives pay either by way of regular direct contributions to my Department or through family law court orders which are transferred to the Department.
In addition to these contribution payments, the operation of the maintenance recovery provisions also yielded savings on scheme expenditure of a further £133,919 in 1994. These related scheme savings arise as a result of the withdrawal of some claims which were actively in payment. For example, some spouses make arrangements to provide adequate support to their families once the Department intervenes. Some people are no longer entitled to the benefit or allowance as a result of new information obtained when the case is investigated. Certain other cases of cohabitation or concealed additional means are also discovered in the course of maintenance recovery investigations.
Altogether, therefore, an overall total of £393,722 was yielded directly and indirectly in 1994 through the liability to maintain family provisions. There are 24,500 people in receipt of lone parent's allowance and deserted wife's benefit and allowance which cost £94.6 million in 1994.
The number of liable relatives contributing towards this cost will continue to grow significantly as the Department concludes its investigations on the many other cases in hand. Changes to the liability to maintain provisions in 1992 strengthened powers of collection and enforcement. Legal proceedings are being considered in a number of cases where the liable relative has failed to comply with the legislation.
The present system for tracing liable relatives is labour intensive and slow. The new Maintenance Act, 1994, when commenced, will increase the powers available to the Department to trace and seek payment from liable relatives now resident in other countries. It is expected that these measures will increase substantially the number of liable relatives making a contribution towards social welfare support for their separated spouses and their children.
There are a number of issues which have emerged during the course of the operation of the system. These include the lack of an appeals mechanism in the legislation; the administration rules for assessment of ability to pay, and the correlation of these to court assessment rules in family law maintenance cases; the effect of the system on existing informal maintenance arrangements, part-time child custody, provision by liable relatives of "maintenance-in-kind" eg VHI, mortgage repayments etc. for their spouses; transfer of maintenance from women recipients, particularly when they have mortgage commitments and other regular outgoings; the identification and pursuit of putative fathers in unmarried cases; the need to interact more effectively with family mediation services, at initial desertion/separation stage, to ensure that maintenance issues are resolved then; and the tracing of deserting spouses who have disappeared without making any contribution at all to their families.
All of these issues will be considered in the context of the proposed new unified lone parent's allowance.
John O'Donoghue
Question:31 Mr. O'Donoghue asked the Minister for Social Welfare the number of non-nationals in receipt of social welfare payments; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3175/95]
Claims by non-nationals for social welfare payments are determined in accordance with the same statutory conditions as claims by Irish nationals and accordingly the nationality of social welfare claimants is generally not recorded. In the case of unemployment payments these conditions include requirements regarding availability for and genuinely seeking work. This would normally mean that they would have to be free from restrictions, which sometimes can apply to non-nationals, on their residence in this country or on their freedom to take up work.
Statistics on payments to non-nationals, in so far as these are available, are currently being compiled by my Department who will communicate with the Deputy as soon as possible.
Dermot Ahern
Question:32 Mr. D. Ahern asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he intends standardising means tests for all social welfare claimants; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3177/95]
The means test criteria are broadly similar for all social assistance schemes. Nevertheless, there are variations in the manner in which some of the components are assessed. These relate mainly to the treatment of capital and income from employment where different levels of disregards and rates of assessment are applied across the various schemes. Variations also exist in the definitions of assessable income while claimants of unemployment assistance living in the family home are assessed with the value of board and lodgings.
The introduction of a single means test for all social welfare schemes would give rise to significant costs, particularly if implemented on the basis that existing recipients would not suffer any reduction in their payments. Nonetheless, I propose to keep the matter under review within my Department during the coming year with a view to developing proposals for changes in the future.
Brendan Kenneally
Question:33 Mr. Kenneally asked the Minister for Social Welfare in the case of widows aged 60 to 65 years, where the free entitlements are retained on the death of their spouse, whether or not these free entitlements are allowable to the widow whose deceased spouse did not previously qualify because another dependant lived in the house but does not now live there; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2740/95]
The extension of free schemes to widows aged 60 to 65 years last year was limited to widows whose spouses had already had entitlement to the free schemes. The extension was primarily designed to meet objections to the termination of entitlements in households at a time when an elderly widow might be struggling to adjust to the stress and expense occasioned by the death of her husband. It was also recognised that the free schemes effect the household and not just the recipient.
Any extensions of the free schemes have serious financial implications and could only be considered in the light of available resources being made available.
Austin Deasy
Question:34 Mr. Deasy asked the Minister for Social Welfare his views on the situation whereby persons paying self-employed PRSI contributions who reach the age of 66 just before the three year qualifying period are disqualified from obtaining any benefits; and if he will examine the case of a person (details supplied) in County Waterford. [2433/95]
Self employed persons became insured under the social insurance system with effect from 6 April 1988, the commencement of the 1988-89 contribution year. Contributions at the Class S rate are payable by this group and provide cover for old age (contributory) and widow's and orphans pensions.
One of the conditions to qualify for a survivors' contributory pension, which is the payment of interest to the Deputy here, is that contributions must have been paid in respect of at least 156 contribution weeks (3 years) between the deceased person's date of entry into insurance and the date of his or her death. Entitlement is based on either the applicant's own or their late spouse's social insurance record.
This condition applies to all workers paying the rate appropriate for survivors' contributory pension, as well as the self-employed. Any employee contributions reckonable for survivors' contributory pension purposes may be combined with self-employment contributions when determining entitlement to pension.
It is considered reasonable that in order to qualify for a survivors' contributory pension a person would have paid 156 social insurance contributions.
In the particular case mentioned by the Deputy, the person had been self employed and paid contributions for the years 1988-89 and 1989-90. As he reached age 66 on 16 March 1991 the 156 paid contribution condition to qualify for survivors' contributory pension could not be satisfied. Also there is no record of any contributions recorded in respect of his spouse. His spouse can of course apply for a widow's non-contributory pension, which is payable subject to a means test.