Thank you for the opportunity to raise this issue. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Allen, for coming in to hear what I have to say. It is unfortunate that the Minister of State, Deputy McManus, is unable to be present but I have no doubt the Minister of State, Deputy Allen, will pass on my comments. I thank the Minister of State for coming to Dundalk to help us celebrate the great Dundalk victory in the league last week. As Derry has now also taken the cup it goes to show that all the best footballers come from the North.
Adjournment Debate. - Family Income Supplement.
You can thank Dermot Kealy, whose nephew is an usher here in the Dáil
One of my constituents raised the following issue with me. He rents accommodation from the local authority under the differential rent scheme. The local authority was endeavouring to gain arrears from him on the basis that he is now in receipt of the family income supplement from the Department of Social Welfare and that this should be taken into account in the assessment of income under the differential rent scheme.
This gentleman, like most of the general public, did not agree with this and approached the Department of Social Welfare to find out their attitude. He was told by the Department that they would not regard family income supplement as something that should be taken into account in this regard, that it was for the purpose of extending the income of people who were, perhaps, caught on the borderline between being on social welfare or on low income, and making it more amenable for people to go out to work rather than sit at home and claim social welfare. However, such people have found that, when they avail of the family income supplement, it is then taken back in some shape or form. The Department of Social Welfare informed my constituent that as far as they were concerned family income supplement should not be taken into account by State bodies as extra income in the type of assessment I mentioned.
I recently put down a parliamentary question to the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment to find out how many local authorities are, so to speak, singing from the one hymn sheet, and the answer proves that there are different attitudes on the part of local authorities around the country. Only about 15 county councils, two of which are in my own county, take family income supplement into account while many more county councils, corporations and urban authorities do not. It is incumbent on the Minister responsible to ensure that there is equality as between areas.
On the same day I put down a parliamentary question to the Minister for Social Welfare asking his attitude to this. He gave me a very nice reply to the effect that family income supplement is designed to provide cash support for families on low income to preserve the incentive to remain in employment. He went on to say that payment is not in general assessed as means against other schemes administered by the Department of Social Welfare. I had a conversation with a former Minister for Social Welfare, Deputy Michael Woods, who informed me that after much hassle the health boards around the country agreed that the family income supplement would not be taken into account in assessments for medical cards. However, the word is not getting through to the Department of the Environment and local authorities in the context of differential rents.
The Minister for Social Welfare, Deputy Proinsias De Rossa, went on to say that in his view family income supplement should not be assessable as income for the purpose of determining entitlement under the differential rent scheme and that he proposed to take the matter up with his colleague, the Minister for the Environment. This is an urgent matter.
The general public are probably not aware that this is happening. Not only are local authorities not singing from the one hymn sheet but Ministers and their Departments are not either. It is incumbent on the Minister for the Environment and the Minister for Social Welfare to work this out once and for all. Obviously I will be asking that family income supplement not be taken into account in the context of the differential rent scheme. If ultimately the assessment for differential rent is to be exclusive of FIS, as I hope will be the case, I ask the Department to investigate the possibility of refunding to those people who have been paying rent up to now on the basis of FIS being included in the assessment the money which was taken from them but which was not taken from other people in areas where the local authority regarded FIS as an incentive to people to remain at work rather than claim social welfare.
I thank Deputy Ahern for his comments about my visit to Dundalk. I was delighted to be there to celebrate their victory, even though Cork City was not in the final shake up.
The Deputy expressed reservations about the absence of the Minister of State, Deputy McManus, but she has a genuine reason for not being here. I will transmit the Deputy's regrets to her tomorrow.
I am pleased to have the opportunity of outlining the position in relation to rents of local authority dwellings. The determination of the rents of their dwellings, including the types of income to be taken into account in the assessment of the rents, is the responsibility of local authorities as an integral part of their housing management function. When this responsibility was devolved to authorities in 1986, my Department issued guidelines to ensure that the new rent schemes complied with broad principles in the following matters: the rent payable should be related to income and a smaller proportion of income should be required from low income households; allowances should be made for dependent children; a contribution towards rent should be required from subsidiary earners in the household; and provision should be included for the acceptance of a lower rent than that required under the terms of the scheme in exceptional cases where payment of the normal rent would give rise to hardship.
Local authorities were also expected to ensure that their overall rental income reflects adequately, in so far as it is practicable to do so, the management and maintenance costs of the estate of houses under their control.
The Government's programme emphasises its commitment to the strengthening of the role of local authorities and the discharge of as many functions as possible by them consistent with the local government reform programme. It is in keeping with this approach that local authorities have maximum discretion in the discharge of their functions such as the assessment of income and the determination of the rents for their dwellings.
Within the guidelines I have outlined, authorities have wide discretion as to the types of income to be taken into account in the assessment of rents and how to deal with hardship cases, allowances for dependent children, poverty traps and any other anomalies that arise in individual cases. I should draw attention to the fact that one of the basic principles provides specifically for recognition of family circumstances, by requiring authorities to make allowances for children in a household.
The guidelines do not specify for local authorities that a family income supplement should or should not be included for the purposes of income assessment for local authority rents. In particular, my Department has not taken a position as to whether or not FIS should be included. That decision rests solely with individual local authorities.
The Minister of State, Deputy McManus, is aware of the views of the Minister for Social Welfare in this matter. She would be slow to take any action which would detract from the autonomy of local authorities in matters such as rent assessment and the management of their housing stock which should manifestly be matters of local responsibility.
So much for The Worker's Party.
So much for independence of local authorities.
Examination of the question of excluding any type of income from rent assessment must have regard to the implications for local responsibility and its financial effects on authorities, including their capacity to carry out proper maintenance programmes and management of their dwellings.