Noel Dempsey
Question:200 Mr. Dempsey asked the Minister for Social Welfare the number of people who claimed disability benefit on 25 November 1987. [9479/96]
Written Answers. - Social Welfare Benefits.
The number of people in receipt of disability benefit at the end of December 1987 was 71,525. The equivalent information in respect of 25 November 1987 is not available.
John O'Leary
Question:201 Mr. O'Leary asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will amend the regulations covering the payment of contributions for the self-employed in order that they can qualify for contributory old age pensions, by allowing those who could not, due to age, have paid sufficient contributions to pay these contributions in arrears by way of one lump sum in order to qualify them for contributory old age pension when they reach the appropriate age; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9580/96]
To qualify for the old age contributory pension, a person must, inter alia, have entered insurance at least ten years before pension age. This condition has been a feature of the scheme since its introduction in 1961. The purpose of the condition is to link entitlement to a pension with a reasonable level of contributions to the social insurance fund during the course of a person's career. This condition applies to self-employed persons in the same way it applies to all insured people. Accordingly, self-employed people, who become insured for the first time when social insurance was extended to the self-employed in 1988 and who were then aged 56 or over would not qualify for the old age contributory pension. They are, of course covered for survivor's and orphan's pensions.
However, self-employed people in that age group, who had been insured as employed contributory for any period prior to age 56, could qualify for the old age contributory pension as such insurance can be combined with insurance as a self-employed contributor for old age pension purposes.
Refunds of the old age contributory pension element of the contribution may be made to those who entered insurance for the first time less than ten years before pension age and who fail to qualify for either old age contributory or non-contributory pension.
When social insurance was extended to the self-employed, detailed consideration was given by the Department to the possibility of providing for entitlement to the old age contributory pension to persons who entered insurance for the first time as self-employed contributors less than ten years before pension age. The net cost of paying old age contributory pensions to all self-employed contributors, who were aged between 56 and 66 in April 1988 was estimated at £756 million over the lifetime of the persons concerned. The extra rate of contribution which would need to be paid by self-employed contributors generally to finance such an extension was estimated at 2.4 per cent over a 50 year period. Allowing self-employed persons to buy pension rights by paying the outstanding years' contributions to qualify for an old age (contributory) pension would also be very costly to the Exchequer unless the payments made by the individual self-employed contributors were calculated on an actuarial basis. The cost to an individual contributor of buying rights on any basis, including a lump sum payment, would be prohibitive.
The National Pensions Board in its final reportDeveloping the National Pension System puts forward, inter alia, a number of recommendations relating to eligibility for old age pensions, including proposals for a wider range of pro-rata pensions related to the average number of contributions over an insured lifetime. However, it also recommended that the number of paid contributions to qualify for an old age (contributory) pension be increased from 156 (three years) to 520 (ten years) contributions. The report and its recommendations are being studied within my Department at present.
While I, in principle, favour apro-rata pension approach, I have no plans to relax the requirement that a person must have entered insurance at least ten years before pension age.