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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 17 Apr 2002

Vol. 552 No. 1

Written Answers. - Pension Provisions.

Alan Shatter

Ceist:

488 Mr. Shatter asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the reason a person (details supplied) in Dublin 16 has not to date received a satisfactory response to her letter of September 2001 to his Department concerning the appeal lodged on behalf of her spouse against his Department's refusal to grant her spouse an old age contributory pension; the position in this regard; and if he proposes to introduce reforms which would enable a pension to be awarded to this person's spouse. [11747/02]

A claim for old age non-contributory pension from the person's spouse was disallowed on the grounds that her means, derived from his occupational pension, were above the limit for entitlement to a pension. Under social welfare legislation, decisions on claims must be made by statutorily appointed deciding officers and appeals officers. I have no role in making such decisions. Representations were received on behalf of the person concerned questioning the logic and rationale of the underlying legislation governing the means test and indicated that the person wished to appeal the decision. The Social Welfare Appeals Office indicated in a reply to these representations on 5 October 2001 that if, following an explanation of the underlying legislation, the person wished to have the claim referred to an appeals officer for consideration this would be arranged. A full reply to the person making the representations, dealing with the general policy and legislative issues raised, was issued from my office on 18 October. No further communication was received. If the person concerned wishes to pursue an appeal he should contact the Social Welfare Appeals office.

Means tested schemes are an important part of the social welfare system as they provide basic payments for people who do not have the necessary social insurance to qualify for contributory payments but who can satisfy a means test. The schemes are designed and intended to ensure that resources are directed to those who are most in need. In the case of couples where one or both are claiming a social assistance payment the overall means of the household are counted to determine each individual's means. In the case of old age non-contributory pension this is done through rule 4(a) of Part II of the Third Schedule of the Social Welfare Act, 1983, which provides that "the means of the person shall be taken to be one half of the total means of the couple".

In this case, the household means are derived from the pension of the person concerned which results in an income assessment of €317.78 per week on the claim of his spouse. This is considerably in excess of the means threshold of €124.43 per week which would give entitlement to a pension at the minimum rate. In order that the person's spouse could receive a pension, it would be necessary to introduce means testing on an individual basis without regard to the overall household income. Such a system would be extremely costly and would neither be in keeping with the overall objective of the assistance system nor with the aims of the programme for prosperity and fairness which sees individualisation of the social welfare system being progressed in the context of a continuation of joint assessment of means. Overall policy in this area has been to extend social insurance coverage to as many people and groups as possible so that people can establish their own individual records and receive payments in their own right. In addition, the qualifying conditions for old age contributory pensions have been eased considerably to make it easier for those with reduced or broken insurance records to receive an individual payment.
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