Vol. 540 No. 3
237 Ms Shortall asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs if any provision has been made or is planned for the provision of social insurance credits for women who were forced to retire from the Civil Service on marriage; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20850/01]
The primary purpose of social welfare credits is to secure the PRSI entitlements of insured workers, who are temporarily outside the paid workforce for reasons such as unemployment, illness etc. in a manner which is consistent with the continued viability of the social insurance fund. The underlying requirement for entitlement to the award of credited contributions is that a person must have worked previously and paid PRSI contributions.
Where a person has no PRSI contributions paid or credited for more than two full contribution years, they are not allowed to claim credits until they return to work and pay PRSI contributions for at least 26 weeks. Given that the award of credits can give entitlement to a range of social insurance benefits, provided that a certain number of paid contributions have been made, I am sure the Deputy will appreciate that it is necessary to have some limitations on such award.
I have no plans to introduce any changes to the current provisions in regard to the award of social insurance credits for persons in the category referred to by the Deputy. Specific issues in relation to the operation of the former marriage bar in the public service are a matter for my colleague, the Minister for Finance.
I might add that the Government is committed to extending pension cover to as many categories as possible and as a result more flexibility has been introduced into the qualifying conditions for the old age contribution pension scheme. Measures already introduced include the reduction in the average number of PRSI contributions required for pension purposes to ten and the payment of a special half rate pension for those with pre-53 insurance contributions who cannot satisfy the average contribution test. Pro-rata pensions are also available for people with mixed rate insurance records. These measures are making it easier for people, particularly women, with reduced or broken insurance records to receive a contributory pension.
