Social Welfare and Pensions Bill 2014: Second Stage

Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

Minister for Social Protection (Deputy Joan Burton)

Over the last three years, many changes have been made to the social protection system to improve its long-term sustainability and to ensure we have a modern, responsible welfare state that provides both a safety net for those who need it and a springboard back to work for those who want it.

There can be no doubt about the hardship and difficulties which the economic crisis has caused for our people. However, despite the need to get the public finances in check and the need to reduce overall welfare expenditure, the safety net has been protected and maintained.

This year, we will spend an estimated €19.6 billion on social welfare. Research has consistently shown that Ireland's system of social transfers is among the best in the EU in terms of preventing poverty. The best long-term protection against poverty is, of course, fairly paid and secure work. That is why I have focused on transforming the Department from a passive benefits provider to an active and engaged public employment service.

That work is paying off. The live register is down from a previous peak of 15.1% to 11.8% now. Every 10,000 reduction in the numbers of people on the live register saves approximately €95 million in the social welfare bill. Getting people back to work is the best way of reducing welfare expenditure and we are doing it, although there remains a long way to go. This Bill continues that crucial process of reform.

As well as benefiting the recipients directly, social transfers have a significant effect in local communities where money is spent, as well as on the economy as a whole. For many recipients, their money is paid through the network of post offices that are spread around the country in rural and urban areas. As we all know, post offices provide an invaluable service to our communities.

I was pleased to sign a contract with An Post for over-the-counter cash payment services for welfare clients at the end of last year. This was, for the first time, signed on foot of a detailed specification of services and was openly and publicly advertised in a procurement competition. It was essential that the procurement competition was fully compliant with European procurement law, given the previous challenge adjudicated on by the European Court of Justice concerning cash payment services delivered through An Post.

The contract has been awarded for two years and commenced on 2 January this year. The contract may be reviewed annually for a further four years thereafter - that is, an accumulated period of up to six years in total up to December 2019. I am confident that the contract for the delivery of payments to welfare clients is now robust.

In this Bill, I am making changes to ensure that the legislative provisions underpinning these arrangements are equally robust. They will ensure that what we are doing can stand up to scrutiny at national and European level, and that the arrangements are not open to challenge in any way, which is what happened before.

The provisions being considered here today do not interfere with the contract. Neither do they diminish the contract, nor jeopardise it. What they do is provide a solid basis for the provision of payment services through payment service providers such as An Post. They do this by providing in legislation that payment functions and services can be delivered under formal contractual arrangements, which was not previously the case.

The measures contained in the Bill update the legal framework behind the new contract with An Post so as to ensure that its activity on behalf of the Department on a week-to-week basis has the backing required to ensure that our fraud and control regime remains robust and resilient. This contract is a very valuable one for An Post. The role the company plays in preventing fraud and helping us in terms of control is really significant.

I am keenly aware of the excellent work carried out by the various staff of An Post, including postmasters. My officials and I will continue to work with An Post, as well as with the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, and his officials, to ensure a strong and vibrant post office network.

I now wish to turn to the issue of the Youth Guarantee. Through the Pathways to Work strategy overseen by my Department, we are succeeding in getting people back to work. A key element of this is the Youth Guarantee, which is about ensuring that young jobseekers in particular get the work, training and education opportunities they need and deserve.

Research shows that early and prolonged periods of unemployment during a person's lifetime can have a permanent scarring effect in terms of earning capacity and well-being. This is a particular problem during an economic downturn, as young people tend to be hit by the impact of job losses more than other age groups. This is because young people tend to be the most junior employees in an organisation and also tend to work in sectors such as retail and services, which feel the brunt of any reduction in demand.

Therefore, it is crucial that an effective strategy is in place to tackle youth unemployment. The key to this approach is the implementation of the Youth Guarantee, the objective of which is to ensure that young people receive a quality offer of training, education, work experience or employment within four months of becoming unemployed.

The implementation of the initiatives planned under the Youth Guarantee requires primary legislation to allow a certain measure of positive discrimination on age grounds for young people in the provision of employment services and supports.

A pilot currently under way in Ballymun has delivered positive results and has received support from the community, the business sector and various agencies. Senators may like to hear more about that.

I firmly believe that the strength of the social welfare safety net was one of the reasons that social cohesion was maintained in Ireland despite the scale of the crisis. The people of this country have continued to support a strong social protection system because they know it will be there for them and their loved ones when they need it, whether through child benefit, a jobseeker's payment or the State pension. However, to maintain that public support it is absolutely essential that we ensure every euro of the welfare budget is properly spent and that where fraud or error arises, we recover the overpayments as appropriate.

With this Bill, I am building on the reforms made to date in relation to recovery of overpayments. I recognise that most social welfare customers receive only the payment to which they are entitled but where overpayments arise through fraud or error, it is essential that the moneys are recovered if we are to ensure the money is there for those who need it and are entitled to receive it. The Bill further extends the powers of the Department to recover social welfare overpayments. Notice of attachment provisions are being extended to allow recovery from payments being made or to be made by public bodies such as Departments. In this way, we can ensure that one arm of Government is not paying out lump sums to individuals who owe significant amounts of money in respect of welfare overpayments.

I am also taking the opportunity in this Bill to transpose the provisions relevant to the social welfare code of EU Directive 2010(41) on the principle of equal treatment between men and women engaged in an activity in a self-employed capacity. This means ending the exclusion from social insurance of spouses or civil partners of a self-employed worker who participate in the activities of their self-employed spouse or civil partner performing the same or ancillary tasks. In other words, this Bill will extend social insurance cover to spouses or civil partners of a self-employed contributor in cases where that spouse or civil partner is participating in that person's business and earning more than €5,000 a year. Heretofore only one of the couple could be insured as a self-employed worker for social insurance benefits. This means that the spouse or civil partner will, under the social insurance system, be able to establish entitlement over time to maternity benefit, widow's, widower's or surviving civil partner's contributory pension and State contributory pension in their own right. This is a very important and welcome reform which will provide excellent value for those involved. While we do not have the exact figures, I understand that approximately 5,000 people will benefit from this reform.

The Bill will ensure that, in general, once a family qualifies for family income supplement, FIS, payment of the supplement will continue for 52 weeks regardless of a change in circumstances, such as an increase in weekly earnings. FIS is a weekly tax free top-up payment for employees on low pay with children. More than 44,000 working families with more than 98,000 children benefit from the scheme. The Department's expenditure on FIS will increase to more than €280 million this year, an increase of 25% since 2012. It is a direct subsidy to people who are on limited hours or low wages to top up their income to provide an incentive to return to work. I have placed a high priority on FIS because the evidence shows that families are better off in work and FIS helps them to continue in work and build towards financial independence. FIS is crucial to working families, and the measure in this Bill is about ensuring that families in receipt of the supplement have security and peace of mind about the duration of their payment. If, for example, workers in a family lost their employment for a certain period, as soon as they go back into employment they will be able to access FIS for the remaining part of the 52 weeks.

In the area of pensions, the Bill is providing for an amendment to the Pensions Act to clarify the notification procedures in relation a direction from the Pensions Authority to the trustees of a pension scheme to restructure their scheme.

I will now outline the main provisions of the Bill. Section 1 provides for the short Title, collective citations, construction and any necessary commencements. Section 2 defines a number of common terms used in this part of the Bill. Section 3 provides for changes to enable functions relating to payment of benefit or assistance and related payment services to be provided under arrangements with selected payment service providers. Section 4 provides that only gains from share option transactions which result in the employee actually receiving shares will come within the definition of "share-based remuneration" in order to benefit from the exemption from employer PRSI liability. Section 5 inserts a new definition of a member state of the European Economic Area in the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005 for the purposes of the amendments in section 6 and section 11 of the Bill. Section 6 clarifies the powers contained in the 2005 Act enabling the Minister for Social Protection to provide for refunds of employer PRSI contributions in the case of certain seafarers employed on board vessels registered in a member state of the EU or European Economic Area and are providing scheduled passenger services between ports within those States.

Section 7 provides that where an employer has a debt owing to the Minister in respect of redundancy lump sum payments and that employer qualifies for a refund of PRSI contributions, the debt owing to the Minister can be recovered from the PRSI refund. The Redundancy Payments Act 1967 provides for lump sum payments by employers to their employees upon their dismissal by reason of redundancy. Where an employer does not pay such a lump sum payment to his or her employees who have been made redundant, the Redundancy Payments Act provides that such payments can be made by the Minister for Social Protection to the employee. The Minister can then recover such amounts from the employer.

Section 8 provides that increases in jobseeker's allowance, pre-retirement allowance, supplementary welfare allowance, disability allowance or farm assist in respect of the qualified adult of the recipient will not be payable for any period during which that qualified adult is resident, whether temporarily or permanently, outside the State, or in prison or otherwise detained in legal custody. Sections 9 and 10 clarify the rules on entitlement to family income supplement to set out the circumstances in which a claimant who is living apart from his or her spouse or civil partner and children can still claim the supplement, and ensure that, in general, once a family qualifies for FIS payment of the supplement will continue for 52 weeks regardless of a change in circumstances, such as an increase in weekly earnings. Section 10 also provides that where FIS ceases to be paid to a family during the 52 week entitlement period and that family requalifies for FIS before the end of that 52 week period, then payment of FIS will recommence for the unexpired portion of the 52 week period at the rate payable at the start of the 52 week period.

Sections 11 and 12 provide for changes in respect of the application of the habitual residence condition for entitlement to certain social welfare payments. The presumption that persons are not habitually resident in the State if they have not been present for a continuous period of two years in the common travel area at the date of making the application is being removed. In addition, a person must satisfy the habitual residence condition for the duration of his or her claim in order for the entitlement to continue. This also allows for the review of habitual residence in respect of persons who were not required to satisfy such conditions under EU law at the date of application for the schemes concerned. Habitual residence is just one condition of these payments. A person must also satisfy other conditions to receive a payment.

Section 13 is a minor technical amendment. Sections 14 and 16 extend the powers for the recovery of social welfare overpayments to include recovery from certain lump sum payments made by the Minister for Social Protection to that person, that is, refunds of PRSI contributions and lump sum payments made under the Redundancy Payments Act 1967 and the Protection of Employees (Employers' Insolvency) Act 1984.

Section 15 enables the secondment of members of An Garda Síochána to the Department of Social Protection to assist it with fraud investigation work. This section also provides for the termination of appointments as a social welfare inspector or as a deciding officer where such a person is no longer working in the Department of Social Protection - for example, if he or she retires, resigns, moves to another Department, the period of his or her fixed-term contract expires, or where the Minister terminates the appointment.

Section 17 extends the provisions relating to the recovery of social welfare overpayments by way of notice of attachment to include situations where the person who has been overpaid has sources of income from payments made from State funds, for example, grants, refunds and repayment of taxes. Section 18 allows for positive age-based discrimination in the provision of employment schemes and supports on objectively justifiable grounds. It also clarifies that the types of employment schemes and supports where positive age-based discrimination can occur will include schemes and programmes which support young unemployed people in setting up self-employment businesses. We have to bring in some positive discrimination in regard to younger people, both in employment and in self-employment, where the Department seeks to support them. These measures will facilitate the implementation of the Youth Guarantee.

Section 19 provides for the transposition of Directive 2010/41/EU on equal treatment between men and women engaged in self-employment so that the spouse or civil partner of a self-employed person will now qualify to pay social insurance and, therefore, qualify for the self-employed benefits of maternity, widow's and widower's and retirement pensions. Section 20 provides for the inclusion of Irish Water as specified body for purposes of using PPSNs. As part of its functions, Irish Water will be transacting with members of the public and will need to share or confirm personal data and information in certain cases. For example, additional water allowances are being provided where a household contains children under 18 years and in order to assess such cases, Irish Water will need to collect and verify the PPSNs of those in respect of whom these additional allowances are to be provided. The best database for that is obviously the child benefit database.

Section 21 provides for the removal of three uncommenced sections of the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005, which are no longer necessary. Section 22 provides for a number of minor amendments to correct textual errors. Section 23 defines the term "Act of 1990", which is used for the purposes of Part 3 of the Bill, as meaning the Pensions Act 1990.

Section 24 clarifies the detail to be provided by trustees to scheme members in the notification, including the right to appeal to the High Court, in situations where the Pensions Authority issues or proposes to issue a unilateral direction to the trustees of a scheme to restructure a scheme. Section 25 provides for similar clarification in regard to the notification of scheme members in advance of the Pensions Authority making a direction to wind up a defined benefit scheme. Section 26 amends section 50C of the Pensions Act to cross-reference the new section inserted.

I commend the Bill, which will provide for a further significant strengthening and reform of our social protection system.

Senator Paschal Mooney

I welcome the Minister. As she will be aware, a number of our amendments were rejected in the other House and, consequently, we are not supportive of the Bill. We admit that social protection payments provide vital support for people and at a time of constrained budgets, it is vital that the budget is spent in the most effective manner possible. Effective control measures are essential to the operation of the social protection system. It is important, however, that this work is done in a manner that recognises the overwhelming majority of welfare recipients are fully entitled to their payments and that the majority of errors that occur cannot be blamed on the customer.

The family income supplement is an excellent means of supporting low income families in employment and we welcome the increase in the minimum period for receipt of FIS but further work needs to be done to eliminate poverty traps. The Government should heed the warning this week from the European Commission which states that the loss of supplementary payments, in particular rent supplement and medical cards, on return to employment makes it more difficult for people to take up work.

We are very concerned by the language in section 3, which appears to open the possibility of the social welfare payments system being moved from the post office network. My colleague, Deputy O'Dea, raised an issue I am not so sure the Minister clarified on Report Stage in the other House. The Minister referred to legal challenges and said this is the main reason she has changed the wording to remove the reference to An Post and to supplement it with payment service provider. I understand that Deputy O'Dea referred to a High Court judgment of 2007 where the High Court threw out the challenge. This was based on a consolidation Act of 2005 which referred specifically to An Post. I would be grateful if the Minister clarified where the 2007 Act comes into all of this and whether it supports her view that removing the reference to An Post is to offset any potential legal challenge.

There is one element of this on which I would be curious to establish the Minister's thinking. The simple reality is that more and more people who have bank accounts are getting electronic payments into them. How will that be addressed? How will we square that circle? In the context of the contract the Department has given for cash payments, in the future, more and more people will get their money directly by electronic transfer and will, in turn, use debit cards at ATMs to get their money without even having to queue in the bank. I am anxious to know the Minister's thinking on the future of the post office network in terms of its relationship with her Department because one cannot be like King Canute and stop the waves if more and more people opt for electronic payments. Is there some way for An Post to develop its own banking system? I would like the Minister to refer to that.

Section 7 provides that where a qualified adult of a claimant for jobseeker's allowance, etc., is resident outside the State, payment of an increase in respect of that qualified adult will not be payable. We suggest this rule may be unfair to people in some exceptional cases - for example, where a person is temporarily resident outside the State in order to take care of an ill relative and they have bills to pay at home. Will they fail to be protected?

Sections 13 to 15, inclusive, provide for the recovery of sums due by deduction from certain payments. Although this is a good way to recover overpayment debts and tackling fraud, many, or even most, overpayment debts arise as a result of a mistake and not fraud. Therefore, it should be made clear in the legislation that the recovery of overpayments in the way envisioned by these provisions should be a last resort.

Section 20 puts certain obligations on trustees. However, there is no penalty contained in the Bill for failure to comply with these obligations. We believe there should be sanctions for failure to comply.

I understand perfectly from where the Minister is coming in regard to the inclusion of Irish Water as a specified body for purposes of using PPSNs and I do not have a difficulty with it in principle. However, it may be a cause for concern because a person's PPSN is a very personal piece of information and it may be undesirable for commercial entities, such as Irish Water, to have access to such personal information. I would like to be assured that usage by Irish Water of this would be very specific and that it would be for the measures outlined and not, for example, to sell it on, for third party use or for any of that type of activity.

The Minister will be aware that FLAC made a number of submissions which were referred to during the debate in the Dáil but I would like to put them on the record. One of the recommendations was that there should be a reasonable lead-in time between the publication of social welfare and pensions legislation and its debate in the Oireachtas and that the explanatory memorandum accompanying Bills include the proposed text of the consolidated social welfare legislation to give context to the technical and textual amendments proposed. It also recommends that following the enactment of this legislation, the Minister's Department should seek prioritisation of the consolidation of social welfare legislation under the Law Reform Commission's programme of statute law restatement consolidating all amendments into a single text.

While the Bill may outline certain clear areas of intent, on ploughing through it, one finds so many references to the principal Act that the text is rendered extremely technical, complex and obscure. There must be a better legislative model available. I ask the Minister to comment.

The third recommendation is to remove and revise section 8(4)(i) to ensure all families in need of an adequate income to support their children are treated equally in terms of eligibility for family income supplement, regardless of the relationship status of the parents. The fourth recommendation is that the proposed new paragraphs 246(1)(d) and 246(1)(e), as proposed in section 10, be deleted. The final recommendation is that section 14 be amended to include detailed procedures to permit due process and fair procedures to a person who may be subject to these powers before any payment is recovered in this way. If this is not immediately possible, the section should not be commenced until such processes, including a right of appeal, are in place. No sums should ever be recovered that risk a claimant falling below adequate income levels. I am sure the Minister subscribes to that view.

I would be grateful to the Minister for clarification on the issue of overpayments. The perception is that most overpayments arise as a result of error rather than fraud. Is that the case?

The payment of child benefit in respect of non-resident children has been a contentious subject in the United Kingdom. The issue should not be exploited in a manner that undermines the excellent relations between Irish people and eastern European communities which reside here. Any changes should be pursued with our European partners on the basis of consensus. Fianna Fáil proposes that where a child is resident in another European Union member state while a parent is working here, child benefit should be paid at the same rate at which it is paid in the country in which the child is resident. This change would require the agreement of other EU member states.

Senator Hildegarde Naughton

I welcome the Minister to the House. There are many commendable aspects to this legislation. The first, section 3, deals with payment service providers and changes the legislation to allow the Department to enhance the services it provides and their proper supervision. Contrary to some commentary on the Bill, the Government has no intention of denuding the post office network. This morning I received correspondence from the Irish Postmasters' Union, IPU, in which it states that it understands that An Post cannot be named in the Bill in the context that has been sought. The company is, however, specified in the related regulations.

The Government wishes to reinvent and modernise the post office network. No announcement has been made and no legislation introduced to allow for the closure of post offices in the near future. The Government is committed to protecting the existing network in so far as possible. It made this clear as recently as 25 February when it announced a whole-of-government review of the nature and number of services that can be undertaken by post offices as a "front office" for the State. The intention is to have post offices do more rather than less. The Cabinet sub-committee on social policy is considering these issues on which it hopes to report in September.

The Fine Gael Party fully understands the concerns expressed by the Irish Postmasters' Union. Representatives of the party recently met representatives of the union to discuss these concerns and consider how best to ensure the future of our post office network. As to the charge made by the Opposition that the Government is intent on dismantling the network, it should be noted that in 2010, the final full year in office of the previous Government, 72 post offices were closed, while only 17 have closed in the period since. Ireland has one of the most extensive post office networks per head of population in the European Union. The Government is fully cognisant that two thirds of post offices are located in rural areas where they provide a much needed and welcome service.

An Post recently won a competitive tender process run by the Department of Social Protection for the provision of over-the-counter cash services for social welfare customers. This contract is worth more than €50 million annually to An Post and its initial two years' duration can be extended to six years. Every party and Senator knows or should know that post offices are considered to be a network of commercial businesses under EU competition law. No Government, irrespective of its composition, can guarantee that An Post will forever win such tenders. An Post is a commercial State body and the rules in place apply to it as they do to all other companies. An Post is free to bid for any business of a public or private nature in a competitive market.

To dispel any doubt on the matter, I propose to discuss in some detail the EU legal position on An Post's position vis-à-vis departmental tendering. Following the Government decision in 1999 to extend the An Post contract for the delivery of social welfare payments for a further three years, a complaint was lodged with the European Commission under the procurement services directive. On 20 December 2002, the Commission issued a reasoned opinion against Ireland in which it recognised that the only obligations imposed in relation to the services were the prohibition of discriminatory technical specifications and that the result of the award process must be sent to the EU Official Publications Office. This had been the argument put forward by Ireland. However, the Commission also stated that, in addition to these obligations, an awarding authority should respect the EU principles of non-discrimination, equal treatment and transparency. These additional conditions compelled the Minister to advertise the payment delivery service on a Europe-wide basis and uphold the principles of non-discrimination, equal treatment and transparency in the award of any contract.

The Department, in consultation with the Office of the Attorney General, rejected the reasoned opinion on 19 February 2003. The case was referred to the European Court of Justice on 1 December 2003 and a hearing took place in Luxembourg on 4 April 2006. The Advocate General to the court gave an opinion on the case on 14 September 2006 which upheld the European Commission claim that Ireland breached competition rules by not publicly advertising the An Post contract. The opinion concluded that the court "should declare that, in deciding to entrust the provision of services to An Post without a prior notice, although there were no circumstances which would have allowed no advertising at all, Ireland has failed to comply with its obligations under the [EU] Treaty". In addition, the Commission retained the right to take further action against Ireland under Article 228 of the treaty if it believed there had been a delay in implementing the judgment of the court.

The court issued its judgment on 13 November 2007 in which it ruled that Ireland did not breach EU rules. It stated that "in entrusting the provision of social benefit payment services to An Post without undertaking any prior advertising, Ireland has not failed to fulfil its obligations under Articles 43 EC and 49 EC and the general principles of Community law in connection with a contract for the supply of such services." However, this case was won on a technicality. In its judgment, the court stated that the Commission had failed to provide sufficient proof that the welfare contract was of "interest" to companies located in different member states. It also found that the Commission had failed to prove that any interested parties would have been unable to express their interest in the contract because they did not have access to relevant information. The ruling maintained that "a mere statement by it [the Commission] that a complaint was made to it in relation to the contract in question is not sufficient to establish that the contract was of certain cross-border interest and that there was therefore a failure to fulfil obligations." The court concluded that the Commission had failed to provide sufficient proof that the contract in question was of sufficient interest to firms across the Community. This was, however, a failure of proofs as opposed to the legal argument presented by the Commission and endorsed by the Advocate General. The Commission's action was dismissed.

While Ireland's victory in the case was technical, the court stipulated that if a contract is of sufficient interest to firms in the Community, it must be subject to a degree of advertising to alert the EU market and allow firms to be given an opportunity to express an interest in obtaining the contract. Clearly, therefore, the State is not in a position to do anything other than advertise and tender for payment contracts from the Department of Social Protection. Such contracts have been tendered and advertised since the relevant judgment was issued. Contrary to what some Opposition Members appear to believe, no Government is in a position to snap its fingers and magic contracts into the hands of An Post ad infinitum.

The post office has completed a programme of complete computerisation and should be in a good position to provide front office services for the State following the current review. It is also uniquely equipped to do so for the financial services sector generally. As with every other company in the State which wishes to maintain a presence, however, An Post must seek new business. While the Government and Fine Gael Party will provide every legal incentive and support to An Post in doing this, they cannot do everything. An Post needs to innovate and provide new services in response to demand.

The second aspect of the Bill I wish to highlight is a scheme of PRSI refunds relating to employers' PRSI paid in respect of certain seafaring employees that has been in operation since 1997.

This intervention is intended to give Irish operators the same advantage, in so far as possible, as their competitors who use low-cost labour. The clarification in section 6 to bring matters in line with EU state aid rules is appropriate and necessary.

I welcome the provision in section 7 whereby an employer qualifying for a refund of PRSI while owing a debt to the Minister due to non-payment of statutory redundancy will have that refund offset against the debt owed. Section 8 offers a welcome tightening of the regulations in respect of the qualifying adult of a claimant who is not resident in the State or in prison. This is a welcome and common sense provision. This restriction, as the Minister has noted, will not prevent ongoing claimants receiving such allowance or assistance as they are entitled to as long as they remain in the State or are not in prison. Section 11 provides for a warranted tightening of the habitual residence condition. The Bill also enables the youth guarantee scheme by providing for very limited age discrimination on the basis that it is discrimination aimed towards a legitimate goal, namely, the provision of employment schemes for young people.

I commend the Minister on bringing forward legislation that is a further addition to the quality work she has done in the Department of Social protection in the past three years.

Senator Marie-Louise O'Donnell

I welcome the Minister to the House. The first visit I made after coming to Leinster House as a Senator was to the Department of Social Protection, which confirmed my view that this is a very benevolent country. That benevolence is clear in our treatment of people who are poor and needy, people who lack education and have not had the same opportunities as others, and people who are not able to look after themselves and need the State to do so. It has always been my opinion that when drink, drugs and mental health issues take over, benevolence takes on another lead. We have huge problems in this area, as the level of related lawlessness will attest.

The provision to expand the role of the local post office is very welcome. I spend a great deal of time travelling around the country and it is clear that the post office, rural transport, mobile libraries, meals on wheels, district nursing services and so on provide socialisation opportunities for people who do not live in cities or large towns. Anything that helps to retain the community post office as a hub of activity in whatever form is a very good thing.

Regarding social welfare overpayments, will the Minister indicate the level of such overpayment and whether it is less than or greater than what she originally estimated or envisaged? What has been the recovery rate in this regard in each of the past four years? What is the most common type of fraud - I use that word loosely - that has been noted?

Has there been any initial report or set of recommendations arising out of the experience of the Ballymun pilot activation of the Youth Guarantee scheme, which has been in operation for a year or so? What are the major lessons to be learned from that pilot and will the Minister do anything differently in its wake when it comes to rolling out the scheme? This is a major initiative and it needs to be progressed without undue delay in a manner that affords sufficient flexibility to ensure it can be adapted where necessary as we go along.

I conclude by referencing the provision in section 18 regarding positive age-based discrimination. Perhaps the Minister should send that section on to the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Alex White.

Senator Marie Moloney

I welcome the Minister to the House. One of the most topical issues dealt with in the Bill is the provision allowing for the designation of post offices as the provider of cash services for the Department of Social Protection. I fully understand why the Minister has to bring forward these particular amendments, which are technical in nature. We cannot ignore EU law on procurement. There are genuine concerns that we might be accused of infringing competition law or leave the way open for a competitor to argue that there is not a level playing field in the market. I followed with interest the debate on this Bill in the Dáil. I cannot understand why any Member would ask the Minister to flout EU law on procurement and thereby leave the Department open to legal challenge.

Like all rural Members, I recognise the value of the post office to rural communities. It is the hub of the community, a place where people can catch up on all the news - who has got married, who has had a baby and who, unfortunately, has passed away. In my parish we have a fantastic family-run post office which is at the heart of the community, whose staff know all the parishioners personally and who keep the community updated on events. No money can buy that type of personal service. It is particularly invaluable for elderly people who do not have access to social media. In fact, the local post office is their social media.

The Minister has secured the contract for An Post to provide the service for the next two years, with an option to renew annually up to a total of six years. It is a very welcome development and coincides with the equally welcome news that the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Pat Rabbitte, is working with the board of An Post, other Departments and other public bodies to develop a whole-of-government approach to the delivery of public services through the post office network. I support that approach and look forward to the outcome of the review.

Senator Paschal Mooney asked how we should address the reality that some people prefer to have their payments processed electronically through their bank accounts. Clearly, it is people's democratic right to do what they want with their money. However, the Minister did manage to ensure that jobseeker's allowance is to be paid via cash only, which was another great boost to the post office network. Perhaps more schemes could be adapted to require that payment be collected in person.

The public has a huge role to play in safeguarding the future of their local post office. There is no point in putting up a public outcry when the news comes that it might be closing; that is bound to happen if people are not actually using its services. We need to drive the message home that we can only do so much in this Chamber. Communities have the power in their hands to protect their post office by making sure they use it.

I welcome the provision in subsection 8(2) whereby payment in respect of a qualified adult will not be paid if the latter does not reside in the State. This has been a bone of contention for the public for some time. At the same time, there are several genuine reasons that a qualified adult could be residing outside the State for a period of time, such as where a parent must accompany a sick child who needs specialised treatment in a hospital or clinic abroad, for example, or a person needs to travel overseas to tend to a sick or elderly parent. I hope the Minister will make provision in the legislation for those types of circumstances.

Deputy Joan Burton

Such persons are ordinarily resident in the State.

Senator Marie Moloney

Yes, but they are temporarily residing outside of it. Perhaps the Minister will clarify that issue in her response.

I agree with Senator Mooney that child benefit should not be paid in respect of children living outside the State. In such cases, the parents should be eligible for payment in the state in which the child is residing. Ireland's relatively high rate of child benefit offers an incentive to people to claim it in this country. The Minister will undoubtedly respond that this is in accordance with EU law and we have no choice but to continue these payments. However, if we must give such payments, surely they should at least be given at the rate applying in the country in which the child is residing?

Senator Marie-Louise O'Donnell

Hear, hear.

Senator Marie Moloney

With regard to the changes in the family income supplement, FIS, scheme, I wholly agree that a claimant who is living apart from the other parent or the children must be required to contribute substantially towards their maintenance. This is the very least we should expect from somebody who is claiming an entitlement to FIS based on the costs involved in raising those children. At the other end of the spectrum, a difficulty arises with the FIS scheme for people who do not work 52 weeks per year, such as catering staff in schools, child care workers and so on. Such people face losing their FIS payment for several weeks at Easter, Christmas and in the summer. In fact, I have spoken to people who decided not to claim unemployment benefit during those periods because of the repercussions for their FIS entitlement. We must cater for people who, because of the nature of their employment, are unable to work for certain periods of the year.

I very much welcome the abolition of the exclusion of spouses and civil partners from self-employment social insurance. Many businesses are run by both spouses or civil partners but self-employed contributions did not extend to both parties. This is a very welcome improvement and I know many women, in particular, will be delighted with the changes, not least farmers' wives who will be delighted with it. For long enough they have been excluded from the system and have not been able to access the services, as their husbands can. They will greatly welcome this measure. When responding to the debate, the Minister might indicate if there are any developments on enhancing the self-employed contribution to include illness benefit in the services available to them.

Section 20 inserts a reference to Irish Water and a list of bodies that are authorised to use PPS numbers. Perhaps we should extend this to the register of electors. The PPS number is unique to an individual. It is the one thing, apart from fingerprints, that cannot be duplicated. If it was on the register of electors it would prevent people being registered two, three or even four times in cases. My sister was registered in four different places where she had lived. I told the council to change the register. So she got four polling cards - let me state she used only one. Keying in the PPS number to check if someone was already registered in another area might be a way forward. This may not be under the Minister's remit but that of the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government.

I have a concern over section 14 which provides for the recovery of payments from, for example, grants, refunds and repayments of taxes. I ask the Minister to confirm that disabled person's grants and third level student grants do not come under that. It is essential for people going back to education to have their grants. If they owe money, it can be paid when they are re-educated and have a job. To take it from a third level student grant or a disabled person's grant would be detrimental to people.

I will speak on amendments on Committee Stage.

Senator Feargal Quinn

The Minister is very welcome. This is a very interesting Bill. I found it very interesting to hear the Minister's words about An Post, which seems to have taken more attention than anything else among the speakers here. I was involved in An Post for the first ten years of its life and like everybody else I have a good feeling about it. However, I want to ensure we are getting good business quotes from it. Having the Minister watch over it with a big heavy stick if there is any misbehaviour is very worthwhile because we need good value.

I also have a query on cash payments through An Post, an issue Senator Mooney raised. I recently spoke to someone in the Central Bank and was told that we are one of the worst in Europe for using the old-fashioned cash and cheques rather than plastic. To what extent are we getting close to overcoming that, particularly using the post office network?

The Minister's efforts to run the Department of Social Protection more efficiently are very welcome. It is run much more on a business-model as far as I can see. The Bill furthers this goal by measures such as ensuring a person is resident in the State and allowing the Department to recover overpayments, which the Minister has explained very well.

From a business perspective, I welcome that social insurance will be extended to cover spouses or civil partners of a self-employed contributor in cases where that spouse or civil partner is participating in that person's business and earning more than €5,000 a year. These people were previously not covered so this will address a big failing in the current system.

We have had some very positive figures recently, with 33,000 fewer people on the dole compared with this time last year and it seems we are making real inroads into unemployment. I ask the Minister to comment on the live register, as the CSO website states this figure is specifically not designed to measure unemployment, contrary to the public perception. The truer figure comes from the CSO quarterly national household survey, which gives the number of unemployed persons at approximately 258,000, not the 400,000 figure we usually hear.

Can we get any estimates on how many people simply do not want to work? We have an unemployment rate of 11.8% according to the CSO, but even during the boom years, our unemployment rate was around 4% to 5%. It has been argued that at least some of these 4% to 5% of people did not want to work even during the boom years and this figure is likely to be even higher now. Can we exclude some percentage from our unemployment figures to get a more accurate unemployment rate? Am I right in saying that the 12.6% figure is not really a true representation of our situation? Perhaps it would be useful to get some plain speaking and clarity on this area from the Minister or whoever can provide it.

We have heard figures quoted previously that one in seven people on the dole have never worked a day in their lives. The UK Government has been trying to tackle the problem by requiring that people out of work for, for example, ten years have to work for six months before they can go back to receiving payments. The concept is to provide some sort of - what it calls - "shock" for them to get back into a working mentality and to also give something back to society. Would the Government consider a similar scheme here? Long-term unemployment is a big problem and such a concept may form part of the solution. I would be interested to get the Minister's views on this idea.

I was very concerned to hear again from the ESRI this month that many people are better off on the dole than in work. It is a matter of great concern to me, coming from a business background, to see people making a choice not to work, albeit for purely financial reasons. The ESRI points out that an estimated 15% of people without children and 44% of people with children would be better off not working given the high costs involved. When things like jobseeker's allowance are added with additional payments for a spouse or partner and children, child benefit, fuel allowance, back-to-school allowances and rent supplement, it seems to be better than getting a low-paid job with many attendant work-related expenses, such paying for travel to work, lunch costs and child care. I cannot believe that this area has still not been tackled adequately. I ask the Minister to touch on this because I believe it is a big problem. Does the Government accept that if all the associated benefits that go with being unemployed are added up, there is a big difference compared with the salary of a low-paid job? Are we doing anything in that area?

On the Order of Business today I raised the issue of child care. Has the Minister considered what other countries are doing in terms of child care which gives people an incentive to work? In Denmark, families pay up to 25% of the cost of day care, with those on low incomes or single parents paying between nothing and 25% of the cost, with discounts for siblings. The government makes up the difference. At the very least we should consider a tax-credit for child care, which would encourage people back to work, especially women, and may even get highly-experienced older women back into work as childminders. This would have the effect of reducing the amount of people on the dole. Has the Minister considered the example of the UK where parents can claim up to £100 a week to cover child care?

The item I brought up this morning was tax credits for hiring household help to get people back to work. On a related point, Sweden introduced tax credits for household help and specifically encourages more people to return to work, especially women after having children. The scheme boosts the economy by getting households to hire people at a much-reduced rate. This could play a huge role in Ireland in lowering child-care costs, something which we desperately need in order to get people back to work.

The specific services eligible for the tax breaks under the Swedish model include cooking, cleaning, gardening and child care. The Swedish scheme also cut the number of illegal workers, who are often paid cash in hand.

In an article by Tim Ross, published in The Daily Telegraph on 9 February 2012, a Google employee in Stockholm was quoted as saying:

It's possible to buy help with housework, like cleaning, baby-sitting, gardening and so on, at a very reasonable tax rate. The actual cost is halved, which makes it easier to promote people to get help at home.

A similar system in Finland resulted in 92,000 people taking up the scheme in one year alone, with the total tax deduction amounting to nearly €43 million. Has the Minister heard of this idea and would she be willing to discuss and study it to see if it is viable? Our population is similar to Finland's and if we were to get anywhere near 90,000 people back to work, it would be of massive benefit in cutting the unemployment rate. We should give that a real try.

I have several other points to make but I will cover them on Committee Stage. I congratulate the Minister on her speech today and the detail she provided which gives us a much better understanding of where we stand. I look forward to the Committee Stage debate.

Senator Terry Brennan

Ba mhaith liom fáilte a chur leis an Aire. The Social Welfare and Pensions Bill 2014 is important. It clarifies qualifications for payment, makes the system more fair, and strengthens the position of the Department of Social Protection in recouping money that is overpaid. This Bill aims to make the system stronger and will therefore improve the social welfare system for others. The social welfare system supports those most in need. Most people who claim social welfare are fully entitled to do so and the Government is committed to ensuring the system is transparent, robust and fair for all. It will also ensure equal treatment of self-employed men and women. At the moment the spouse of a self-employed man or a woman who dies does not enjoy the same treatment he or she would have enjoyed had the spouse not been self-employed. This issue has been brought to my attention and that of many other public representatives over many years. Under the Bill liability for self-employment PRSI contributions in the case of such spouses or civil partners will be subject to the annual income threshold that applies to self-employed contributors in general, that is, €5,000.

The Bill will strengthen the residence requirement for entitlement to social assistance payments and child benefit to ensure that people who are entitled to a social welfare payment receive it. The Bill will also strengthen control of social welfare expenditure by extending the powers to recover social welfare overpayments. If someone who should not claim does so the Department of Social Protection will be able to reclaim the money. This protects those most in need and those who are fully entitled to support.

The Bill will also amend the Pensions Act 1990 relating to the notification of a member of a pension scheme that the pension has been restructured or is being wound up. The Bill contains provisions to regulate the refund of PRSI to certain seafarers employed on board vessels registered in a member state of the EU or European economic area and providing scheduled passenger services between ports within those states. At present if someone is made redundant where an employer does not pay such a lump sum the Minister for Social Protection can make the payment. The Minister can then recover such amounts from the employer but according to this Bill, where an employer has a debt owing to the Minister and qualifies for a refund of PRSI contributions the debt to the Minister can be recovered from the PRSI refund. This is a logical way for employers to pay their debt to the Department to the benefit of all.

The Bill addresses increases in payment and will stipulate that these will not be payable for any period during which the qualified adult is resident, temporarily or permanently, outside the State, or in prison or is otherwise detained in legal custody.

In respect of family income supplement, if the claimant lives apart from his or her spouse or civil partner and children, the worker must maintain his or her spouse or civil partner and contribute substantially to the maintenance of the children. If the worker is no longer engaged in full-time employment or qualifies for certain weekly social welfare payments, family income supplement, which is paid for 52 weeks, can be reviewed. If there is an increase in the number of children, or if changes in payments have taken place, an increase in the weekly amount of family income supplement is payable. Under this Bill the presumption that persons are not habitually resident in the State if they have not been present here or in any other part of the common travel area for a continuous period of two years is being removed. A person must satisfy the habitual residence condition for the duration of his or her claim in order for entitlement to continue. This allows for the review of habitual residence in cases of people who already receiving payment. The measures contained in the Bill will strengthen the powers to recover social welfare overpayment and will lead to savings in overall social welfare expenditure.

Senator Sean D. Barrett

I welcome the Minister and thank her for her address. The rate of post office closures slowed down recently. The development of a banking service through the post office, in particular, the payment of higher interest on savings should have been considered. The Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Rabbitte, told the House that there had been pressure from the banks not to allow that. We prevented the growth of the post office in order to help the banks into which we have put €64 billion.

We all welcome the reduction in the numbers on the live register. The Minister said that during the boom many people were given invalidity and disability payments, which was a way to disguise unemployment to a degree. Does she have programmes to reduce that? Disability or invalidity does not always preclude a person from every kind of work. The person in question might be unsuited only for a particular type of work. Is there some scope to change that register of social welfare payments because it unnecessarily ranks people as unsuitable for work, when there are many kinds of work they might be able to do?

There is a problem in the extension of social welfare benefits to the self-employed because the contribution for employees is 4% and for employers it is 10.75%. What will be the rate for the self-employed? If it is only 4% and there is no employer contribution, the fund will have to be topped up from somewhere. A certain amount of caution is needed. While it might be desirable to extend the benefits, doing so without having commensurate contributions will put the burden back onto the Exchequer.

The numbers for recovery were 40% for fraud and 37% client error, which left 23%. The Free Legal Advice Centres, FLAC, asked if the Department paid money inadvertently to a person could it be treated differently from money that was given as a result of fraud? If it inadvertently gave money to a person who was very badly off the Department might look upon it more kindly. I think that is what FLAC said. It may be that the kind of error the Minister seeks to correct is not always of the one type. She has our support in dealing with the 40% but some of the 23% may be genuine errors made by people on very low incomes who might otherwise face a serious problem.

In terms of the measure the Minister mentioned on prisons, is she certain that if we reduce social welfare to the families of people in prison we would not create real difficulties for those who have already suffered the loss of somebody who has been incarcerated? Has the Minister considered how the change might apply? The criminal is already punished by being in prison, but if we reduce social welfare one could ask whether the family would suffer more. After all, they are innocent parties. One could ask whether it would be suggested that this is a case of double jeopardy.

The Minister referred to the requirements for defined benefit schemes to notify people. That is most important. This is an area in which the Minister has had an interest for a long time. Some of the trustees have not been keeping people up to date. Some standard PRSAs with a lump sum worth more than €100,000 can have administration charges as high as €81,000. Is there any way we could protect people who have been saving for their old age from horrendous administration fees? I welcome the measures outlined in the Bill. Sometimes trustees have to take their duties more seriously. We are currently seeking that directors of private companies should take responsibility for what those companies do and not just sit looking out the window at board meetings. If trustees run up massive debts – sometimes it seems to be almost a competition, for example, that X, Y or Z pension fund is €800 million and, hurrah, one wins a gold medal for that - they have responsibilities and I hope the Minister will call them to account. Having criticised other people for wasting money, I do not wish to waste time or exceed the allowance of time.

Senator Kathryn Reilly

I welcome the Minister. I wish to refer to a number of issues during my contribution. One issue I wish to raise is An Post. I also wish to refer to the habitual residence condition. Given the Minister’s presence, I could not miss the opportunity to briefly mention the Youth Guarantee.

We are already half way through the year and the Department’s PRSI yield is more than €100 million greater than was anticipated in budget 2014. There is scope to seize upon the opportunity to use the Bill, future social welfare legislation or the forthcoming budget to provide some relief to those who have suffered in recent years due to austerity. The Minister could restore the respite care grant to the 85,000 people who are caring for a relative with a serious illness or disability.

The main issue of concern for Sinn Féin, which was discussed at length in Dáil proceedings, was the potential threat to rural post offices. The principal purpose of section 3 is to delete the reference to An Post. The section provides for changes to enable functions relating to payment of benefit or assistance and related payment services to be provided for under arrangements with selected payment service providers. We believe that removal of the reference to An Post as the named service provider could have devastating implications for the survival of local post offices. Many post offices have closed. Previous speakers mentioned how many have closed in recent years both under the previous Government and this one. In my county of Cavan the closure of post offices in rural areas is common. What hope is there for isolated rural post offices if the service is removed from them? The Department has explained the deletion was made in order to remove the privileged position of An Post in the consideration of service providers in the future. As my colleague, Deputy Ó Snodaigh, articulated, there is a belief that An Post should hold a privileged position given the important role the network of post offices plays in communities. The network in itself is critically important to the social fabric of communities in rural Ireland. Post offices are a strategic asset and the threat of further loss of services must be taken seriously.

I appreciate what has been said about procurement and European law but the fundamental point is that the situation goes beyond just competition and is about providing an essential social service to communities, especially rural communities, and equality of access. The Grant Thornton report highlighted that up to 557 out of 1,150 post offices could close if the social welfare contract is removed. We will oppose the sections in which reference to An Post as the service provider is being removed and we will propose amendments accordingly.

Perhaps I have missed the point in terms of changes to habitual residence, but could the Minister explain how the changes could affect people who may currently have an active appeal on the habitual residence condition? It might be blatantly obvious but I am keen to hear a response for information purposes.

I wish to move on to the positive discrimination provisions of the section on the implementation of the Youth Guarantee. What schemes in particular does it cover? In the Youth Guarantee implementation plan, it is mentioned on page 20 that the penalty process applied to young people will be differentiated from that applied to other jobseekers. It essentially states that because of the use of positive discrimination measures whereby opportunities under the Youth Guarantee scheme will be prioritised for young people and that other cohorts will be displaced from access to those opportunities, young people will be expected to demonstrate a higher level of engagement. The penalty rate process that is set out for young people specifies reductions to €75 and €111 concurrently. That is fairly stringent.

In talking about positive discrimination measures, it would be remiss of me not to mention the negative discrimination measures faced by young people under the current system. I refer to reduced jobseekers' rates. The system is based on a belief that cutting already reduced rates for young people is fair. It is a case of a carrot and a very big stick. I accept the Department is ring-fencing more opportunities for young people through the positive discrimination measures but unfair negative discrimination already exists in terms of reduced jobseekers' rates. I accept the Minister cannot say too much but I urge her to examine jobseeker rates for young people in the forthcoming budget.

Minister for Social Protection (Deputy Joan Burton)

I will just go through a number of points that were made. Senator Marie-Louise O’Donnell asked about analysing the recovery of the repayments. They are very significant. For the three years of this Government we have recovered €175 million in overpayments. If people look at the social welfare bill, in 2010 the recovery of overpayments was €34 million; in 2011 it was €51 million; in 2012 it was €53 million; and in 2013, with the changes the Senators agreed to in previous social welfare Bills, the saving was more than €70 million.

I will make one little comparison which might be helpful to people. I know some people were wondering in the context of the budget whether free travel is under threat and the answer is that it is not. Free travel costs approximately €77 million in total. The recovery of the overpayments last year financed the vast bulk of the free travel scheme. Some of the decisions in which I have been involved in social welfare have been difficult but recovering the overpayments in a very humane, careful and considered way is critical to sustaining some very important elements of the social welfare system.

Other Senators, including Senator Barrett, asked about the analysis of how the overpayments occurred. The latest analysis and detail I have relates to 2011, when 42% of cases were suspected fraud. We use the term “suspected” fraud because everyone knows that when people make a claim they are a bit confused and are excessively hopeful that a certain presentation of the case will result in a better outcome. That was in 42% of cases.

The rate for customer third party errors, usually in cases where circumstances have changed but the Department was not been notified, is 37%. Departmental error accounts for 8% while moneys from estates accounts for 13%. Not too long ago, the special investigations unit did a special analysis in which we discovered some people claiming means-tested benefits who had bank deposits of between €250,000 and €500,000. By and large, they would not have qualified for a means-tested benefit. In the event of the death of such a claimant, the overpayments would be recovered from their estate.

The Ballymun pilot project referred to by Senator Marie-Louise O’Donnell has been under way for just one year but the amount of positivity it has generated is encouraging. I have visited it five times to get a good sense of it. It essentially brings together all organisations dealing with young people in a committee chaired by my Department to get a cross-sectoral approach to helping young people make a life-plan. I have talked with quite a few of the young people involved. I encountered one young man with a good degree in law and related matters who did not rate doing CVs. He did not really understand that he had to make a really strong case to get a placement in a solicitors' firm. After working with the initiative, he has found a placement. In other cases, young people wanted to start their own small businesses and qualify in self-employment services such as hairdressing and barbering. Again, many of them had good outcomes. I accept one pilot project does not speak for everything. However, when I visited the project recently with the European Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion, László Andor, the positivity from the 50 young people involved was amazing.

We have to push work experience into schools. Where people spend three or four years in further or higher education, we have to find a way, as they do in Germany and Austria which has a similar population size to ours, of including three to four months’ work experience. Accordingly, when a student applies for a job after qualifying, they can engage with an employer because they have experienced the world of work. We have got great support from employers in this regard. They are critical because we have to change the culture where employers make room for young people. In Germany and Austria, as part of corporate-social responsibility, employers, including public service employers, are expected to be open to giving people work experience. In the current climate, employers say the determining factor is not necessarily academic or educational qualifications but attitude. If someone has never had a work experience, they might not understand the kind of things over and beyond qualifications that employers are trying to get from young people.

In the last year of the previous Government, the number of post office closures was significant.

Senator Hildegarde Naughton

It was 72.

Deputy Joan Burton

Since then, in the lifetime of this Government, the number of post office closures has slowed down.

Senator Paschal Mooney

The Government keeps trotting out this figure but what is the context? The context was an economic downturn.

Acting Chairman (Senator Pat O'Neill)

Allow the Minister make her point, Senator.

Deputy Joan Burton

There has been a certain amount of political scaremongering about post offices. Post offices are important not just in rural areas, but in city centres and disadvantaged communities in urban areas. Anyone with a bank account tends to use that facility to receive a retirement pension or child benefit payment. Much and all as one may admire and like one’s local post office, the convenience of the electronic fund transfer is very alluring. The critical issue for An Post is how it will identify how it will offer, in effect, a banking service. Obviously, it has a very popular savings service. The Department of Social Protection generates a significant amount of business for An Post. Mail, for example, comes to over €10 million to the company every year. The over-the-counter payment service is worth more than €50 million a year, as well as services such as the household charge which can be paid through the post office. I have improved the legislation to give An Post the possibility of providing a greater service in this regard. Along with the suite of services An Post provides, however, it needs to provide better banking type facilities on a current account basis. As broadband rolls out to remote communities, the electronic fund transfer becomes more of a possibility. That is a matter for An Post and it is not my job to tell it how to do its business.

During the debate in the Dáil, Members there - not so much here today - suggested changing the legislation to reflect the requirements of public procurement regulations. The changes being made in this legislation are to ensure An Post and the awarding of the contract, which was done in open competition, is not subject or put at additional risk of being attacked. People have to make a judicious choice there. An Post is referred to widely in the regulations.

Senator Quinn spoke at some length about people going back to work and the calculation of the numbers unemployed. The critical point is that the CSO, Central Statistics Office, quarterly national household survey gives a better picture of the total number of people who are entirely without work. The difference between that and the live register is people signing on for credits and people in part-time work. If one deducts the numbers signing on for credits and in part-time work, it comes to approximately 100,000 people. That is how the quarterly household survey came up with the figure of 250,000 without work.

The critical point is that they are people without work. Many of them are in jobless households. Jobless households cover a variety of households but all the international research suggests that in jobless households the outcomes for the children can often be much poorer than in a household where either one or more adult participates actively in the workforce or in self-employment. That is why it is a vitally important issue.

Senator Quinn asked whether people were better off on the dole and not working. The statistics show, and the CSO has confirmed it, that more than 75% of people on the live register get a social welfare payment of €188 or less a week. The minimum wage is €8.65 an hour. If people have a job, even if they are on a starter minimum wage, and they work, say, more than 30 hours a week it is self-evident, if one does the mathematics, that they are significantly better off and the further they go above the minimum wage, and the more hours they work, the more they earn. We can compare somebody working, say, 37 hours a week at €10 an hour to someone on a social welfare payment of €188 a week.

The complications in our system, and I have mentioned it previously, are where people are in receipt of rent supplement. In our system we pay just under €30 to each family with a child where the individual parent is on a jobseeker's payment. I refer to a family with a large number of children or if one is on rent supplement which, even in a rural area, might be worth €600 a month - in the Dublin area, particularly in the case of a large family, it could be worth up to €1,200 or €1,300 a month. That is why my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, is changing to the new housing assistance payment, HAP, in the housing legislation. In that case, in a family with children where one of the adults is unemployed and on rent supplement they lose that rent supplement if one of them gets a job. If, say, they are in the Dublin area they need a job that pays not just in excess of what they get on social welfare but also what they get in rent supplement. That would greatly increase the figure, whereas if one is in a social housing situation with a local authority, as Senators know, they are on a differential rent. Their accommodation is not taken once they get a job but they pay somewhat more for their accommodation as their income rises in terms of differential rent. It is very important that we go ahead with that reform in the current housing legislation. I believe that will be fundamental to getting more families housed. A relatively small number of people on the social housing lists are in that employment trap and it is critical that we help as many families as possible to get out of it.

On family income supplement, currently we have three supports to individuals going back into employment. They are JobBridge and JobsPlus, which pays employers €300 cash a month for every month they employ somebody more than one year on the live register and €400 a month for somebody more than two years on the live register. In the six or seven months since JobsPlus started, almost 2,500 people have participated. In addition, we have family income supplement. We are increasing the amount spent on family income supplement. It is approximately €100 a week for the first child and further payments for subsequent children. Those are the main points raised.

On the issue of fraud, we have widened the measures in this legislation and we will take on up to 20 gardaí who will bring their expertise, along with remaining members of the Garda but also the staff of the Department, and literally beef up the amount of work we do, particularly in the detection of fraud, and, if appropriate, subsequent prosecution by the gardaí.