Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 7 December 2023
101. Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of applications received by the Department in each of the last five years for domiciliary care allowance; the number rejected each year; the reason for these rejections; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [54178/23]
View answerThe question relates to domiciliary care allowance and the increasing number of rejections under domiciliary care allowance based on the number of claims. The Minister of State might outline whether he is concerned that the number of rejections is increasing at a time when we know, because of an increase in the rate of autism, that the number of children that should qualify for domiciliary care allowance is unfortunately going up.
Domiciliary care allowance is a monthly payment to a parent or guardian in respect of a child aged under 16 who has a severe disability and requires care and attention substantially over and above that usually needed by a child of the same age. This care and attention must be given by another person, effectively full-time, so that the child can deal with the activities of daily living. The child must be likely to require this level of care and attention for at least 12 months.
The number of applications for domiciliary care allowance received by my Department increased from 8,609 in 2018 to 8,719 in 2019. There was a slight reduction in the number received in 2020, most likely due to the Covid-19 pandemic, when 7,289 applications were received. However, the numbers increased substantially in 2021 to 9,131. Last year, the number of new applications surpassed the 10,000 mark for the first time, when 10,524 were received. The number of domiciliary care allowance applications that were disallowed at the initial decision stage in 2018 was 2,225, and in 2019 it was 2,875. In 2020, 2,639 applications were disallowed, and in 2021, this figure was 2,478. Last year, 3,948 applications were disallowed at initial decision stage. It should be noted that some of these applications would have gone on to be awarded on review where further medical evidence was received, or on appeal to the Social Welfare Appeals Office.
As domiciliary care allowance is not means-tested and does not require PRSI contributions, the main reason that a customer would not qualify for the payment is that the child does not satisfy the medical criteria. A very small number of applications may be disallowed where the habitual residency condition is not satisfied, where the child is in full-time residential care, or where an application is not fully completed. Applicants are advised to provide as much detail as possible at application stage, including any additional information or documentary evidence that is relevant, medical or otherwise, to ensure that all information is available for consideration in the decision and assessment process.
Obviously I do not have any figures for 2023, but as the Minister of State said, the number of claims registered in 2022 was 10,524. The number of claims rejected in that year was 3,948. I rounded the figures and that is just short of 40%. That seems to me to be a very high level of refusal. I am bit surprised to hear the Minister of State say that claims that were changed on review are still registered as being rejected. I would have thought that the record would have been correct. Similarly, I would have thought that on appeal the Department would have corrected the record. It is a very high number. As I said, one would expect the number of claims to increase because, as I am told by disability organisations, the number of people requiring services is going up. In a number of cases recently, I have been absolutely stunned to learn that the Department has not agreed that the child in question needs care and attention way over and above what a normal child would need.
My understanding, from discussions with officials, is that the rate has not increased over time, notwithstanding the fact that 70% of disallowed claims eventually do get granted. The explanation for this is the supply of the medical information. It tends not to be supplied in the initial application, at least in these particular cases.
If the Department is not getting the information it requires the first time, and many of the people who are applying for the allowance have their own challenges in life, are not super literate and do not read law, I would think that quite a bit could be done to make the application form more useful in terms of what is required from the professional and what is required from the parent. In many cases, when a parent comes to a politician, you advise them to write a diary of what their life is like and then get professional back-up to validate that that is true. That is weighing down the process and tying people up in a lot of red tape. Some people are better able for it than others. We have to always remember, in welfare, that not only are we dealing with very vulnerable children, but in many cases we are dealing with vulnerable parents.
There is an amenability in the Department in terms of looking at the question of backdating claims. People get the application in as soon as possible and then some of the medical information follows. We are looking at a way of maybe improving that. It is also important to state that budget 2023 saw new legislation coming into effect, with a new provision put in place making domiciliary care allowance available for children with severe illness or disability who remain in hospital for up to six months after birth.
