The information requested by the Deputy in respect of the number and nature of inspections carried out by social welfare inspectors for the years 2012 to date is not available in my Department.
This relates to differences in the way investigations were recorded in the past and the fact that some investigations may have passed through multiple officers between starting and ending. However, I can provide you with the overall numbers of control reviews carried out by my Department in each of the years in question (Table below).
Control reviews can be carried out by Social Welfare Inspectors, Deciding Officers and other officers of my Department. In many cases a single investigation may be worked on by a combination of these different officers, including inspections by social welfare inspectors. Consequently, it is not possible to disaggregate the number of inspections carried out by social welfare inspectors from the overall number of investigations.
Year
|
No. Reviews
|
2012
|
1,196,184
|
2013
|
1,105,197
|
2014
|
1,148,354
|
2015
|
1,105,314
|
2016
|
948,216
|
2017
|
754,525
|
2018
|
742,265
|
2019
|
609,025
|
YTD Aug 2020
|
331,640
|
I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.