Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 5 February 2015
8. Deputy Denis Naughten asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Social Protection her plans to address the persistent control savings associated with child benefit; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [4716/15]
View answerEvery year, the Department of Social Protection staff in Carrick-on-Shannon very effectively identify between €70 million and €80 million in control savings under the child benefit scheme. Is there not something fundamentally wrong when 10% of the control savings on an annual basis are consistently identified as relating to large-scale fraud, overpayments or errors within the scheme?
Child benefit is a payment to parents for the support of their children. It is paid to some 615,000 families in respect of 1.18 million children, with an expenditure of approximately €1.9 billion in 2014. This payment, I am happy to say, increased by €5, to €135 per month, with effect from January 2015. Child benefit will remain a universal payment because of its crucial importance to families, mothers in particular, but also fathers who are parenting their children alone, and I intend to increase it again in the budget later this year.
Safeguarding the child benefit budget is a priority and in this regard the Department has taken a very strong approach to ensuring that it is only paid to eligible families. A policy of issuing continuing eligibility certificates to parents commenced in 2008 and is still in operation. The control policy for the scheme is continually reviewed to ensure that the controls in place to prevent the kind of fraud and abuse the Deputy has referred to continue to be effective and relevant.
As a result of these reviews, additional enhanced and updated control measures are devised and implemented.
Control savings represent the amount of money that would have to be spent in future if the control work was not undertaken. They do not include cases of departmental or clerical error or where a customer voluntarily informs the Department of changes to his or her means or circumstances which results in a change to the rate of payment.
The total savings from child benefit control activity was €74 million in 2013. The Department undertook approximately 400,000 continuing eligibility reviews of child benefit customers in 2014. This control activity generated some €70 million in savings in respect of expenditure that would otherwise have occurred. The level of savings from this exercise has fallen in recent years owing to the effectiveness of the controls in the child benefit scheme. While I am satisfied that the control system is good, the systems are continually reviewed and upgraded as information technology develops.
In each of the past five years, between €70 million and €80 million has been generated in control savings in the child benefit scheme. Individuals associated with the troika recently questioned the universal character of the child benefit payment. The payment should remain universal, although it could be paid in a much more effective manner. The Departments of Education and Skills and Social Protection have linked up in respect of enrolment data for pupils in schools. However, the Department of Social Protection continues to issue 600,000 letters per annum to child benefit recipients, creating a requirement for enough paper to wallpaper the pitch of Croke Park two and a half times, because it is not linked up with the National Educational Welfare Board. Will the Minister ensure such a link is established? One of the conditions for receiving child benefit is that the child for whom it is paid must be attending school. This condition is not regularly enforced.
I am not sure the Deputy's final point is correct. On the issue of whether a child attends school or receives home schooling, the Constitution provides that parents have a significant role in decisions regarding their children. The legislation must reflect the constitutional rights of all citizens.
The good news I have for the Deputy is that the troika left town some time ago. I note a spokesperson for the International Monetary Fund, one of the members of the troika, commented recently on child benefit. There are differences of opinion on this payment. For instance, in the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, child benefit is not paid to any family with an income in excess of £65,000 and, where it is paid, it may be clawed back in tax reductions. I believe in a universal child benefit payment. All of the studies on poverty and so forth show it is highly effective in ensuring that the money goes to the caring parent, which is of most benefit to the child.
I must ask the Tánaiste to conclude because we are over time.
Control checks are important and play a significant role in cases where people are changing residence or moving to another country.
The problem is that if the Departments of Education and Skills and Social Protection and the National Educational Welfare Board were linked up, many more abuses in the system would be identified and much greater savings secured. This link should be established once for all to eliminate the annual control savings. The reason I raise this matter is that teachers tell me that some parents lack the motivation to ensure their children attend school. The National Educational Welfare Board has published details of cases involving parents who had to be dragged through the courts and fined to persuade them to ensure their children attended school. Surely it would make more sense to threaten such parents with the withdrawal of child benefit, rather than spending 12 months dragging them through the courts and having children lose out on a year's education to achieve the same objective.
The Deputy is suggesting that the payment of child benefit should be entirely conditional on a child attending school.
That is the law.
The law requires children to receive an appropriate education. For almost all children, this is provided in a school environment but, as the Deputy is aware, there are families who are dedicated to home schooling.
Naturally, there will be exceptions.
We have to allow for parental choice.
The Minister is distracting from the issue.
As Deputies will be aware from media reports, the Department of Education and Skills has undertaken to use personal public service numbers, PPSN, for children at primary level, as is already the case at second and third level. The Departments of Education and Skills and Social Protection are co-operating on mapping the location of children for the purpose of planning new schools. When the project is completed there may be scope for additional co-operation, subject to data protection controls.
