2026-01-15

13. Deputy Paul Murphy asked the Minister for Social Protection if he will introduce an emergency winter payment for disabled people to compensate them for the cuts imposed on them in the Budget; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2795/26]

This follows on from a number of previous questions. I would say disabled people watching this at home are screaming at their television screens because they are being told by the Minister not to worry as a permanent payment is coming. What they are saying, and I quote Joan Carthy, is that people are suffering today and they cannot wait another day, never mind another four years. They desperately need an emergency €400 winter cost-of-disability payment now to make up just a fraction of the cuts the Minister has implemented. This is the ask and it is very simple.

What Deputy Murphy is not acknowledging is that we have responded with a €10 increase in the weekly rate of payment. We have responded with the highest ever increases in the child support payment. We have responded with a €20 per month increase in the domiciliary care allowance and a €5 increase in the fuel allowance, all of which are permanent and none of which will be changed from year to year. That is why we are doing the work on the permanent cost-of-disability payment, on which I look forward to hearing Deputy Murphy's thoughts and proposals and engaging with him. That is why we made changes to the wage subsidy scheme in recent months to encourage employers to give more employment opportunities to people with a disability. That is why, in budget 2026, a record amount of €3.8 billion was provided by the Department of Children, Disability and Equality to disability services, to ensure people get the right supports at the right time and in the right place throughout the country, and to ensure that services are where they need to be for people with a disability. There was a response in budget 2026, and the continued interpretation that we have not responded is unfair and untrue. We will respond with a permanent measure and I look forward to engaging with all of the groups on what this looks like.

I find it bizarre that the Minister is saying he has responded. He has not responded. There is an ask that has come as a consequence of his budget decisions, which cut a bit over €114 from disabled people. While it is true that the Minister has given a little bit of this back through the small increases, he has left people worse off to the tune of more than €1,000 per annum. Their ask is that they need, at the very least, an emergency winter payment now. The Minister is claiming he has responded to that with the original budget, which is where the cuts were made in the first place. Disabled people are responding to the budget. It is why they have come up with their ask. In response to the Minister's point about services, which is what we hear non-stop, disabled people would say that the majority of them are not in receipt of services. This is not addressing the additional costs they have as a consequence of being disabled. Before the latest round of costs, 13.6% of disabled people were unable to heat their homes properly. One in five are in arrears on their utility bills. It is a very simple ask for an emergency payment now. Disabled people cannot wait for this process. They cannot wait for the next budget.

We are working on a process. We have introduced extra payments through budget 2026. We cannot just dismiss services and the extra investment in services in the way Deputy Murphy has done. That is also crucial and we continue to work on this process.