Question:
224 Dr. Upton asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs if a person (details supplied) in Dublin 12 is entitled to the back to school allowance. [12980/01]
Written Answers - Social Welfare Benefits.
The back to school clothing and footwear, BSCF, allowance scheme is designed to assist certain recipients of social welfare and health board payments with the cost of children's school uniforms and footwear. The scheme operates from the beginning of June to the end of September each year and is administered on behalf of my Department by the health boards and neither I nor my Department has any function in deciding individual cases.
A person may qualify for payment of the BSCF allowance if he or she is in receipt of a social welfare or health board payment or participating in an approved employment scheme or attending a recognised education and training course and have household income at or below certain prescribed levels.
The person concerned is a widow with one child dependent and the income limit that would normally apply in such circumstances is £124 per week.
However, there are special conditions in place which allow people participating in an approved employment scheme such as community employment, CE, to retain their entitlement to secondary benefits including the BSCF allowance as long as their household income is less than £250 per week.
Under the scheme an allowance of £63 is payable in respect of qualified children from two to 11 years and an allowance of £78 is payable in respect of qualified children from 12 to 22 years.
If the person concerned feels that she satisfies the qualification criteria outlined she should apply to the community welfare officer, CWO, at her local health centre. The Deputy may also be interested to know that I have established a working group to undertake a review of the back to school clothing and footwear scheme as part of my Department's series of programme evaluations. The review is examining all aspects of the scheme including the rates of payment as well as the income limits, the means test, time of payment, the eligibility criteria and other issues. I expect to have the working group's report in the near future.
Pádraic McCormack
Question:225 Mr. McCormack asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs if recipients of the family income supplement automatically qualify for special needs payments such as back to school grants, confirmation and first communion grants; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12995/01]
The back to school clothing and footwear, BSCF, allowance scheme is designed to assist certain recipients of social welfare and health board payments with the cost of children's school uniforms and footwear. The scheme operates from the beginning of June to the end of September each year and is administered on behalf of my Department by the health boards and neither I nor my Department has any function in deciding individual cases.
There is no automatic entitlement to the BSCF allowance. A person may qualify for payment of the BSCF allowance if he or she is in receipt of a social welfare, including family income support, FIS, or health board payment or participating in an approved employment scheme or attending a recognised education and training course and have household income at or below certain prescribed levels. These income levels vary depending on the composition of the household and they are increased each year in line with budgetary increases in weekly social welfare payments. Details of the income limits for 2001 are shown in the following tabular statement.
There are special conditions in place which allow people participating in an approved employment scheme to retain their entitlement to the BSCF allowance as long as their household income is less than £250 per week. Under the scheme an allowance of £63 is payable in respect of qualified children from two to 11 years and an allowance of £78 is payable in respect of qualified children from 12 to 22 years. An estimated 2,500 families in receipt of FIS qualified for the BSCF allowance in 2000.
The Deputy may also be interested to know that I have established a working group to undertake a review of the back to school clothing and footwear scheme as part of my Department's series of programme evaluations. The review is examining all aspects of the scheme including the rates of payment as well as the income limits, the means test, time of payment, the eligibility criteria and other issues. I expect to have the working group's report in the near future.
Legislation governing the supplementary welfare allowance, SWA, scheme also allows health boards to make a single payment to help meet essential, once-off, exceptional expenditure which a person could not reasonably be expected to meet out of their weekly income. These payments are known as exceptional needs payments, ENP, and are normally made to people in receipt of social welfare or health board payments. Health boards recognise that confirmation and communion times involve families in additional expense and all boards assist with such costs under this provision.
However, there is no automatic entitlement to an ENP. Health boards decide each application on its merits having regard to the income and circumstances of the applicant. Payment of ENPs are made at the discretion of the health boards and neither I nor my Department has any function in deciding individual cases.
Income limits various household sizes in 2001.
|
Household size |
Income Limit |
|
Couple with 1 child |
£194.40 per week |
|
Couple with 2 children |
£209.60 per week |
|
Couple with 3 children |
£224.80 per week |
|
Couple with 4 children |
£240.00 per week |
Limit is increased by £15.20 per week for each additional child
|
Lone Parent with 1 child |
£124.00 per week |
|
Lone Parent with 2 children |
£141.00 per week |
|
Lone Parent with 3 children |
£158.00 per week |
|
Lone Parent with 4 children |
£175.00 per week |
Limit is increased by £17.00 per week for each additional child.
Nora Owen
Question:226 Mrs Owen asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs if he has apologised to the 80 year old man who was recently awarded £73,875 by his Department as a result of intervention by the Ombudsman; if he has offered any compensation for the effort this man expended and the frustration he endured over the years to secure this result; if he will commence an investigation into the way in which this injustice occurred and to establish beyond all doubt whether there are other people who have had to suffer as a result of similar incorrect decisions by his Department; if he will publish the results of this investigation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12996/01]
The person in question claimed old age contributory pension in November 1986. At that time the Department's central records section showed that he had an average of 16 contributions a year since he first became insurably employed whereas a yearly average of at least 20 contributions was required to qualify for pension. His claim was accordingly refused. He did not appeal that decision.
The record on which this decision was based showed that he did not have any paid or credited contribution after 1973. However, arising from an inquiry by the Ombudsman in 1999 it came to light that additional credited contributions had in fact been awarded to him subsequent to 1986 for the period 1973-1986 where he had been in receipt of unemployment assistance. It is not clear why these credits had not been awarded earlier as the relevant claim papers are no longer available. It appears that in 1990 the local office at which he had been claiming notified the central records section that they were due. Due to an oversight, the person's pension entitlement was not reviewed in the light of this new information at the time. This review was undertaken in 1999 and arising from this he qualified for retirement pension from 1986 at age 65 and for old age contributory pension from 1987 at age 66. He was paid arrears of £61,588 net of other payments made to him during the period. The delay in paying him his entitlements was acknowledged separately and he was also paid compensation of £12,287 at that time in respect of loss of purchasing power over the period.
The systems in place in my Department normally ensure that a person's full insurance record is established. In this regard, it should also be pointed out that the pension claim form also includes a number of questions that are designed to enable the Department to ensure that all social insurance contributions are taken into consideration, including a question about any other social welfare payments made to the person. Unfortunately, in this case in responding to this question, the person concerned did not indicate that he had been claiming unemployment assistance. If he had done so, the position could have been rectified at that point. The credits at the heart of the problem in this case were brought to account through paper based clerical procedures which are no longer in use. For some years now, the unemployment assistance payments system has been computerised and all credits due are awarded automatically and updated to an insured person's contribution record.
I accept that the problem was essentially due to human error in the failure to follow standard procedures on this occasion. I am satisfied that this was an isolated case which arose from totally exceptional circumstances. I was pleased to note from the Ombudsman's report that the number of complaints in respect of my Department had decreased by 55% since 1997 and that the efforts made by the Department in recent years to provide a more client-focused service and the improvements made in areas such as the provision of information to clients on services and decisions contributed to this decrease.