asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will discontinue the taking of PRSI from those women who contributed to national health insurance prior to 1953 who left employment in the mid-fifties in order to rear their children and have now returned to paid employment but will not apparently qualify for contributory pensions; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
Ceisteanna-Questions. Oral Answers. - PRSI Contributions.
13.
One of the conditions for entitlement to retirement or old age contributory pension is that the claimant has a minimum yearly average of contributions paid or credited from 1953 or from the date of entry into insurance, whichever is the later. A person who leaves the workforce to rear children and who subsequently returns to insurable employment may fail to qualify for contributory old age or retirement pension because of the gap in their insurance record, depending on the number of years of absence from the workforce. However, the contributions paid by that person on resuming insurable employment provide cover for short term benefits such as unemployment and disability benefit and also for pensions such as invalidity and widows' pensions, for which a lifetime average of contributions is not required. To discontinue the payment of contributions by people in this situation would be a serious disimprovement in their position and there are no plans to introduce such a provision.
The present position, and the Minister's response to my question, clearly indicate that the noble words in the Constitution regarding the role of women in the home is not being taken seriously. I have dealt with a number of people, who have formed themselves into a small organisation, who paid national insurance between 1947 and 1953, left work to look after their children as the Constitution tells them they should and returned to work about 1982 or 1983. They learned that they will pay up to 13 years PRSI but because they worked between 1947 and 1953 their calculations will be based on the length of time since they first entered insurable employment with the result that they will not receive pay-related pensions. The Ombudsman has reported on this gross anomaly in our social welfare system. It is very unfair on the people who are affected. I should like to ask the Minister to look at this question and ensure that those people are not victimised because they made contributions prior to the introduction of the present system of social insurance. Will the Minister, if he cannot do that, take a lower level of PRSI from those people seeing that they will not qualify on the same basis as everybody else?
The Deputy has put a separate question from the one before me on the Order Paper. My reply relates to the Deputy's question which asked me if I would discontinue the taking of PRSI from those women. The Deputy asked about the people who have lost out because of earlier contributions and I should like to tell her that that matter is being kept under review.
Everything is under review.
That is the position. There is a better chance of this being dealt with under me than there was in the last four years when the Deputy was in power.
Under-review Woods. Will the Minister agree that those referred to by Deputy Harney are a disadvantaged group because many of them were forced by the practice of the time to leave employment on marriage? Will the Minister agree to give this urgent attention? Will he consider, for instance, excluding from the 1953 rule anybody with 15 years minimum contributions prior to pension age?
The question, which is a broad one, is being considered by the National Pensions Board in the context of a national pension plan. The Deputy will be aware that I asked the board to deal with the question of the self-employed immediately because I wanted to take action in that area. The board produced a report on that matter a short time ago and now are working on a national pensions plan. The question raised by the Deputy will be considered in that context. I appreciate that difficulties have arisen and I should like to assure Deputies that I will keep their views in mind.
Some time ago when a similar question was put to the Minister he told us that certain costs were involved. Will the Minister give us the approximate cost of helping those people?
I do not have that information on my file. It could cost £50 million if we adopted one approach and about £32 million if whe adopted what is called the pro-rata approach.
Per annum?
No, over the number of years that those people would be in benefit. The figures I have given are approximate.