The facts speak for themselves. I thank Deputy Browne (Carlow-Kilkenny) for his remarks. The points he made in regard to widows and widowers were well made. To extend free schemes to all widows and widowers not currently eligible for them would entail additional expenditure in the region of £25 million and would incur a huge cost to the Exchequer. We did make some changes in this regard and provided an increase of £5 for people over 66 years of age. That provision will come into effect in the next few weeks.
The Minister for Finance, in recognition of difficulties raised by Deputy Browne (Carlow-Kilkenny), Deputy John Browne (Wexford) and others, made changes to the widowed parent bereavement allowance in the budget. The existing special bereavement allowance for widowed parents in the tax years following the tax year of bereavement is £1,500 in year one, £1,000 in year two and £500 year three. This has been increased to £5,000 in year one, £4,000 in year two, £3,000 in year three, £2,000 in year four and £1,000 in year five.
In regard to the issue of people with disabilities, which is an interdepartmental one, my Department alone introduced a range of measures which will cost £10 million in 1998 and £17.5 million on a full year basis. One of the main measures is the increase of £5 and £3 respectively which will result in 91,000 people with disabilities being brought above the rates recommended by the Commission on Social Welfare. The new payments will range between 101 and 118 per cent of the recommended levels and that is a substantial improvement.
There has also been a significant increase in the disregard of DA recipients' wages from £36.30 to £50. I hope to be able to increase that disregard further for people in receipt of disability allowance and blind pensions in the coming years. In special recognition of the difficulties experienced by people with disabilities, I was able to dedicate an additional sum of £4.825 million from savings made in the Department to assist community and voluntary organisations working with people with disabilities and older people. The funding helped to provide a range of equipment necessary to improve the quality of life of people with disabilities, including the provision of accessible buses, motorised wheelchairs, training equipment, information systems, deafness aids, computers and special beds and hoists. A further £50,000 was made available to the Irish Council for People with Disabilities for the purchase of computer equipment for its 30 county networks. That funding was greatly welcomed.
On the question of dental treatment, perhaps Deputy Browne (Carlow-Kilkenny) could furnish me with details of the case to which he referred. A number of Members raised the issue of the free fuel scheme. The scheme, which entails a payment of £5 per week for 26 weeks of the year to eligible recipients, was examined prior to the budget with a view to increasing it. However, I took the view that it would be preferable to give elderly people a £5 increase on a year-round basis although I accept that people other than old age pensioners receive the free fuel payment. It was much more costly to increase pension payments than it would have been to extend the free fuel scheme. Interestingly, the free fuel allowance has not been increased since 1985. The CPI from August 1985 to March 1998 was 8.3 per cent, so the price of fuel has not increased very much.
A Deputy referred to a possible price increase by the ESB. The Department pays for a set number of units and if the price increases, the Department still pays for the set number of units. Therefore, that argument does not stand up.
One of the main rationales behind not changing the free fuel allowance this year was that I felt it would be more appropriate to give a substantial increase to old age pensions every week of the year and not just change the free fuel allowance which is given for 26 weeks of the year. The smokeless fuel allowance, which amounts to an additional £3 per week, has been extended to Limerick, Wexford, Arklow, Drogheda and Dundalk from 19 October 1998. The total expenditure on free fuel, as per the published Estimate, is £45.2 million. The numbers in relation to the 1997 outturn are 287,000 fuel recipients and 99,000 smokeless fuel recipients. An additional 14,000 will qualify because of the extension.
The hoary old chestnut, the self-employed, is an issue which has addressed my mind quite often over the past number of months. I considered all the options carefully and they will cost a significant amount of money. That is the reality. Therefore, the Government has to make a judgment call on where this issue lies among the priorities. All Deputies will refer to the need for more investment in people with disabilities, carers, widows and old age pensioners. All of these matters must also be considered. All previous Governments, including those the members of which are sitting in Opposition here, considered this issue and found they could do nothing other than retain the ten year limit. I recognise some people feel they are losing out because they are a couple of weeks or even a few days shy of qualifying. If we were to reduce the limit to nine years, some people would still be one day or one week shy of the rule. The previous Government, in its wisdom, decided not to touch the ten year limit and refund the pension element to people who did not qualify. We are addressing this issue, but it must take its place in the list of priorities.
The student summer jobs scheme is being maintained exactly as it was last year. In this period of economic boom people might question the need for a student summer jobs scheme on the basis that there would be plenty of jobs of this nature available. We have included it with an estimate of £9.8 million. We estimate that about 16,000 students will apply under this scheme, the closing date of which is 26 June. The scheme has been publicised. We have received 15,436 applications to date, 10,348 of which have been approved, and we have issued 8,228 job certificates. The scheme is worthwhile because, apart from giving the students the experience of working for their communities, it facilitates many community groups. I do not know if any members received a copy of the sponsor book, but it shows the work which is taking place in our community, and the student summer jobs scheme assists that.
A number of members raised the issue of the carer's allowance. As I said before, the interdepartmental working group is up and running. The Carers' Association has had a number of meetings with us so it could provide an input to that review. The review is expected shortly and obviously we will examine the issues flowing from that in the budgetary context.
On FIS and the self-employed, as the committee will be aware, in the budget I was able to fulfil a commitment in Partnership 2000 to calculate FIS on a net income basis. That had been sought for a long time and we succeeded in doing that. There was no commitment in Partnership 2000 to extend FIS to the self-employed. As I said before, it would cost £30 million to extend FIS to the self-employed. It is an issue which, in the context of the entire social welfare budget, would have to take its place in the list of priorities as determined by me and the Government.
One or two Deputies referred to the back to work allowance scheme. This is an extremely beneficial scheme and is very successful. Employers, employees and the self-employed who are part of this scheme have frequently told me it is one of the best schemes available to those who are unemployed. Some 6,000 people have taken part in the scheme to date. Some 5,000 of those have ceased to be supported by the scheme in that their cycle of support has expired. Some 11,000 claims have been terminated. Most of the those would have returned to the live register in some shape or form. There was 8,900 people self-employed under the scheme and 12,100 were employed.
I think I have referred to all the matters raised by the members. If there are specific issues to which I did not respond, members can take them up with me later. Deputy Moynihan-Cronin raised the issue of outside specialised assistance. The increase of £2.5 million is due mainly to the year 2000 issue, which will cost the Department in the region of £8.5 million between this and the year 2000. It will ensure the millennium bug will not cause computer difficulties for whoever is Minister on 1 January 2000. Computers develop problems and people get paid to fix them.