The aim of the national fuel scheme is to assist householder who are on long-term social welfare or health board payments and who are unable to provide for their own heating needs. A payment of £5 per week, £8 per week in smokeless zones, is paid to eligible households for 26 weeks from mid October to mid April.
In order to be eligible for assistance under the national fuel scheme, the person must satisfy a means test. A substantial improvement in the means test was introduced by me in the 1999 budget. A person may now have a combined household income of up to £30 per week or savings-investments of up to £22,400 over and above his or her pension and still qualify for fuel allowance.
Any increase in the rate of payment would have to be considered in the light of the modest increase overall in domestic fuel prices since the current rate of the fuel allowance was set, taking into account the substantial increases in primary payment rates over the same period.
The national and smokeless fuel schemes were reviewed in 1998 as part of my Department's series of programme evaluations. The review group took the view that improvements in the national fuel scheme cannot be looked at in isolation from the improvements in the primary weekly payment rates. With regard to the payment rate, the group concluded that the present rates of payment should remain unchanged if improvements in primary payment rates fully compensated recipients for all price inflation, including fuel price inflation. In that regard, substantial increases in all the social welfare primary payments of either £3 or £6 per week were paid from June 1999 with further increases of either £4 or £7 which came into effect at the beginning of May 2000.
Fuel allowances are not the sole mechanism through which assistance is provided to people with heating needs.
There is a facility available through the supplementary welfare allowance, SWA, scheme to assist people in certain circumstances who have special heating needs. An application for a heating supplement may be made by contacting the community welfare officer at the local health centre.
Where a person would not normally qualify for a heating supplement there is provision under the SWA scheme to pay an exceptional needs payment, ENP. ENPs are payable at the discretion of the health board taking into account the requirements of the legislation and all the relevant circumstances of the case.
Expenditure on the national fuel scheme has increased by approximately 17% in the last seven years from £37.5 million in 1993 to £44 million in 1999.
Any change in the rate of payment would have significant cost implications and could only be considered in a budgetary context.
