Vol. 486 No. 4
56 Mr. Howlin asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the additional cost involved in extending the free fuel scheme at the £8 per week rate to all rural and urban beneficiaries; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2682/98]
The additional cost of increasing the fuel allowance to £8 per week for those not already in receipt of that rate is estimated at £22 million per annum.
The aim of the national fuel scheme is to assist householders who are on long-term social welfare or health board payments and who are unable to provide for their own heating needs. A fuel allowance of £5 per week is paid to qualified householders for 26 weeks from October to April each year.
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 was later extended to 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.
I have no plans to make the additional £3 per week allowance available to people who live outside designated smoke free zones. However, my colleague, the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, is currently considering proposals to give effect to the Government's commitment in An Action Programme for the Millennium to extend the ban on bituminous coal to major urban areas. The geographic areas covered by the smokeless fuel allowance will be reviewed in that context.
58 Mr. Bell asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs if he will withdraw the means testing of young people living at home with their families who apply for unemployment assistance; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2672/98]
I refer the Deputy to my previous replies to Questions No. 28 on 15 October 1997 and No. 31 on 26 November, 1997.
Unemployment assistance is a means-tested payment paid to unemployed people between the ages of 18 and 66 not entitled to insurance-based unemployment benefit. Payments are means-tested to ensure that the limited resources available are directed at those most in need. In assessing a person's means for unemployment assistance purposes, account is taken of any cash income the person may have together with the value of any capital or property. In addition, the value of any benefit or privilege enjoyed by an applicant, such as that of free board and lodging in the family home, is assessed.
It is sometimes alleged that the benefit and privilege rule for young unemployed people, encourages them to leave the family home in order to qualify for higher unemployment assistance payments and rent supplements. However, the limited evidence which is available does not suggest that this is happening to any significant degree. I have mentioned the main findings of this research in recent replies on this topic.
While the available evidence does not support the notion that the benefit and privilege rule is a highly significant factor in the movement of young people out of the family home, my Department will, nevertheless, continue to review this provision in the light of any new evidence which becomes available.
The abolition of the assessment of benefit and privilege as means would have significant cost implications.
60 Mr. J. O'Keeffe asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the position in relation to survivor's pension of a widow where the deceased husband had obtained a church annulment and legal separation and subsequently married in church; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2569/98]
Entitlement to a widow's or widower's pension depends, in the first instance, on the status in law of the relationship between the parties prior to the death of one of them. If the parties, at the date of death, were married within the meaning of the laws of this State, then the survivor of that marriage is a widow or widower for the purposes of the social welfare legislation relating to widow's and widower's pensions.
