Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 20 May 2003

Vol. 567 No. 1

Written Answers. - Social Welfare Appeals.

Jim O'Keeffe

Question:

125 Mr. J. O'Keeffe asked the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the reason there are such enormous delays in dealing with social welfare appeals; and the steps she is taking in this regard to bring about an improvement. [13547/03]

Minister for Social and Family Affairs (Mary Coughlan)

Every person who is dissatisfied with a decision on a claim to a social welfare payment or with certain decisions made by health boards in regard to supplementary welfare allowances has a statutory right to appeal. When an appeal is received, the social welfare appeals office refers the case to the deciding officer for his or her comments on the arguments made by the appellant, including any new evidence submitted. As a result of this process, over one fifth of such cases are revised in the person's favour by deciding officers, usually because new evidence that warrants such a revision has become available.

Some appeals may be decided summarily by an appeals officer on the basis of the documentation presented to him/her. In other cases the appeals officer may decide that an oral hearing is required before the issue can be decided. Where an oral hearing is held, the process will inevitably take longer. The average time taken to process appeals determined during 2002 and the early months of 2003 was 23 weeks. This average period includes all phases of appeals, such as the additional time involved in the determination of appeals where, for example, further investigations have to be made or where adjournments have been sought by the appellant or by the legal representative acting on his behalf. The big majority of appeals are, however, processed more quickly than the average time given above. Excluding the slowest cases, the average processing time for appellants is now 14 weeks.

A consultancy study has been carried out on the appeals process, in order to assist management in effecting improvements. Additional resources have been deployed to the office and the number of appeals on hands has been reduced from 7,500 at the beginning of 2000 to under 5,400 currently. Further measures are also being put in place to reduce the number of appeals on hands and it is anticipated that these will result in significant improvement in processing times during the second half of 2003.

The social welfare appeals system is a quasi-judicial one and the procedures involved are designed to ensure that every appellant's case gets full and satisfactory consideration. While the achievement of further improvement in processing times is a major objective of the office, at all times it is necessary to ensure that progress in this regard is achieved in a manner that is not in conflict with or at a cost to the demands of justice and the requirement that every appeal be fully investigated and examined on all its merits.