Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 September 2022
314. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for Social Protection the analysis that her Department has carried out into decoupling the free travel scheme from other social welfare payments, as per recommendation 9.1.1 of the November 2018 report of the Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport entitled Accessibility of Public Transport for People with Disabilities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46940/22]
View answer315. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for Social Protection if she will provide details of any reviews carried out or commissioned by her Department into the free travel scheme to assess whether the scheme is adequately addressing the needs of persons with long -term health conditions or disabilities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46941/22]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 314 and 315 together.
The free travel scheme provides free travel on the main public and private transport services for those eligible under the scheme. These include road, rail and ferry services provided by companies such as Bus Átha Cliath, Bus Éireann and Iarnród Éireann, as well as Luas and services provided by over 80 private transport operators. There are approximately 1,043,000 customers with direct eligibility. The estimated expenditure on free travel in 2022 is €95 million.
The objective of the Free Travel scheme is to ensure that older people and people with disabilities remain active within their community. The scheme was never intended as a targeted support for people with severe mobility issues or to address the transport requirements of all persons with long-term health conditions or disabilities and therefore no review of the free travel scheme has been carried out to address the transport requirements of this cohort of people.
While the Report of the Oireachtas Committee on Transport, referred to by the Deputy did recommend uncoupling the link between receipt of particular social welfare payments and eligibility for the free travel scheme, implementation of the proposed recommendation would entail a fundamental change to the very nature of the free travel scheme and a significant increase in the numbers qualifying for the scheme – beyond the customer base of the Department – the details of which would not be available to this Department. In essence, uncoupling the link between receipt of particular social welfare payments and eligibility for the free travel scheme would so fundamentally alter the scheme that it would move it away from the Department of Social Protection to become a general transport initiative.
It could also be expected that extensive negotiations, including negotiations around levels of recompense, would have to be undertaken with transport operators to ensure their continued participation in such a considerably revised scheme.
Any such change would also require potentially very significant additional funding for the free travel scheme and would have to be considered in an overall budgetary context.
I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.
