Holly Cairns
Question:672. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of community welfare officers, by INTREO office, from 2011 to date, in tabular form. [35654/23]
View answerTuesday, 25 July 2023
Questions (672)
Written answers
There are 455 staff engaged in the delivery of Community Welfare Service of which 275 are front-line Community Welfare Officers (CWOs) working face-to-face with clients in offices located across the country. The distribution of these 275 CWOs are in the table below:
|
County |
Number of CWOs available to meet clients |
|
Carlow |
3 |
|
Cavan |
3 |
|
Clare |
8 |
|
Cork |
27 |
|
Donegal |
13 |
|
Dublin |
61 |
|
Galway |
15 |
|
Kerry |
15 |
|
Kildare |
9 |
|
Kilkenny |
6 |
|
Laois |
4 |
|
Leitrim |
3 |
|
Limerick |
18 |
|
Longford |
4 |
|
Louth |
10 |
|
Mayo |
10 |
|
Meath |
4 |
|
Monaghan |
3 |
|
Offaly |
4 |
|
Roscommon |
3 |
|
Sligo |
4 |
|
Tipperary |
13 |
|
Waterford |
7 |
|
Westmeath |
9 |
|
Wexford |
13 |
|
Wicklow |
6 |
|
Total |
275 |
There are over 180 staff at all grades including CWO's supporting the Community Welfare Service (CWS). Their roles include but are not limited to:
• Operating the freephone CWS National Phoneline.
• Working in back-office support teams which take on the more routine administrative tasks associated with claim processing and free up front-line CWOs to deal directly with clients and their claims.
• Managing applications for the Daily Expenses Allowance from applicants for International Protection who are living in IPAS approved accommodation. This Allowance is paid on behalf of the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth through the CWS payment system.
• Working in the national CWS Response Team, which is the primary resource in responding to pressure points and surges in demand for Community Welfare Services.
• A small training team provides training for new and existing members of the CWO Team.
• Rent Supplement claim processing nationwide has been consolidated into the National Rent Supplement Section (NRSS) and this team manages a claimload of almost 9,400 claims.
Given the fluctuation in demand for the Community Welfare Service, particularly during the pandemic when resources were allocated to areas where they were most needed, staffing numbers within locations changed frequently. Therefore, it is not possible to provide accurate information relating to number of CWOs for prior years.
I trust this clarifies the matter.