Dara Calleary

I thank the Deputy. The programme for Government includes a range of commitments in relation to support for people with disabilities. This includes a commitment to introduce a permanent annual cost of disability support payment with a view to incrementally increasing this payment. As we know, addressing the cost of disability is not a question of income support alone. The delivery of and access to…

That is a programme for Government commitment. As I said, we are looking at the best way to implement it and we will be working with people with disabilities and their advocates to assess it. I have looked at the ESRI report. As the Deputy said, it estimates that the average cost of a disability ranges from €25,376 to €28,860 depending on the severity. That is much higher than other reports. We a…

I have given the Deputy a sense of the timeline and of the work that is under way. This is priority work in our Department. I hope to bring a firm proposal to the Government in the first half of 2026. As I said, I am engaging strongly with the Minister, Deputy Chambers, about budget 2026 provisions in the meantime. I do not intend to do nothing in this budget. We are working with the Minister, Dep…

The contributory State pension is funded by contributions paid into the Social Insurance Fund. In general, people will qualify for the contributory State pension if they are aged 66 or over and have between 520 and 2080, or more, reckonable contributions, of which 520 must be full-rate pay related social insurance, PRSI, contributions. There are no issues relating to An Post employees who meet the…

I cannot comment on a court case, as the Deputy will understand. An Post operational matters are a matter for An Post and the relevant Minister. I have gone through the reasons we do not keep this information in the Department and how difficult it is to categorise or record applications for State pensions by prior employer name. However, if the Deputy wants to contact me later with a specific requ…

I have outlined the position regarding that information. The Department does not categorise or record applications for State pensions by prior employer name. Issues relating to An Post are a matter for the Minister for communications, who has political responsibility. It is our role in the Department to lay down the rules, set out how it can be done and make payments in relation to pensions. It is…

We all acknowledge the valuable role that family carers play. The Government remains fully committed to supporting carers in that role. The carer's allowance scheme is the main scheme by which the Department provides income support to carers. This year, expenditure on the carer's allowance scheme is estimated to be over €1.24 billion. There are currently almost 102,000 people in receipt of carer's…

I absolutely agree with everything the Deputy said about the work of carers and family carers right across the country. That is why significant improvements have been made and we will continue to make them. I am engaging with the Minister for public expenditure around budget 2026 with a view to progressing further supports for carers. On the work carers do, the point I would always make is that w…

As the Deputy may be aware, the previous Government established the Commission on Pensions to review the State pension system and make recommendations for its future. The commission strongly supported the retention of the qualifying criterion of 520 paid contributions. In part, this is because the actuarial value of the contributory State pension is currently estimated at approximately just under …

One of the major reform measures was the enhanced State pension provision for those who have been caring for incapacitated dependents of 20 years or more. It is being done by attributing the equivalent of pay contributions to such long-term carers to cover gaps in their contribution records for the period in which they were caring for an incapacitated dependant. The measure is available to those …

We have a range of supports available. I am happy to consider the proposal made by Deputy Timmins, but we must also ensure the State pension system is sustainable. The demographics of our country are changing very much as we speak. At present, we have four workers for every person over the age of 66. By the time we get to 2050, however, which is not that far away, this figure will be down to two. …

The Government acknowledges the very important role that foster carers play. We remain fully committed to supporting them. The contributory State pension system already provides a range of measures to recognise caring periods outside of paid employment, such as PRSI credits, homemaking disregards and home caring periods, to recognise caring periods of up to 20 years outside of paid employment in t…

As Deputy Neville knows, there is a commitment in the programme for Government to look at the long-term pension provision for foster carers. The Department is engaging with the Department of Children, Disability and Equality, which has line responsibility and operational management for foster caring, and with Tusla. We will engage with other stakeholders as necessary in terms of looking at the com…

As we discussed earlier, the objective of the school meals programme is to provide regular nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement. In budget 2025, it was announced that the hot school meals scheme would be extended to …

Deputy O'Reilly is spot-on regarding waste. I get that feedback all the time. A five-year-old should not be getting the same portion as a 14-year-old. That is something I am going to engage with the dietitian on. The procurement of school meals is done through the Department of education. We have a school meals working group and I have asked it to look at the whole area of waste. The second issue…

My Department provides the fish assist support, which is available to self-employed fishers on a low income under the means-tested jobseeker's allowance scheme. It is based on the conditions and rate of payment under the farm assist scheme. The fish assist scheme provides favourable treatment to self-employed fishers compared with other self-employed workers through additional income disregards a…

I was surprised at the low numbers on the scheme myself. I have asked my officials to interrogate those numbers and to make sure there is awareness of the fish assist scheme in the communities where fishers are based. We will work on such an awareness programme. I will revert to the Deputy with regard to the provisions on seaweed, which he has discussed with me previously. We have a range of suppo…

We will certainly engage with the Deputy on that. One of the difficulties in relation to seaweed harvesting is that it continues to be a very informal part of the economy meaning it is very difficult to get statistics and measurements we can stand over as regards those participating in it and earning from it, supply chains and so on. We have looked at it. I have followed up with my officials based…

Not for the first time, the Deputy has inaccurately represented what I have said. I did not say that we are outsourcing this to the High Court or we are leaving it to the High Court to sort this out. I said it is not my role to get involved in a case that is before the High Court. Let me be very clear on that. I did not outsource it to anybody. Were I to get involved in a case before the court, th…

We discussed this earlier. The Deputy's concern is with An Post. We do not have any information, and I have gone through the reasons why we in the Department do not possess the information the Deputy is seeking. On Scope, I will engage with it on its decision-making in this space and provide the Deputy with further information on that. It is not just a question of an easy change in the law. Our p…

As I said, I do not want anybody to lose out or not get the pension to which he or she is entitled. The details provided in the Deputy's question today are not as detailed as those provided previously. I will ask my officials to engage with Deputy's office later today in order to give him the information we have and can share with him. I again make the point that we do not have very detailed infor…

Supporting disabled people is a key priority for me and for the Government. That is why the programme for Government contains a range of measures to support disabled people. One of these commitments was the publication of a new disability strategy. I am very pleased that we recently published the national human rights strategy for disabled people. This strategy sets out a whole-of-Government appro…

As the Deputy said, we are examining the whole area of means testing. It is important that our supports are targeted and go to those who need them most in terms addressing people in poverty. The work is ongoing on that, in particular as regards the disability allowance. We have been tasked within the human rights strategy on disability to look at this issue. We have set up a network to examine it…

Absolutely, it is. Under the national human rights strategy for disabled people, one of our jobs is to lead a strategic focus network from within the Department. The network will include people with disabilities and their advocates. I have asked the officials to expedite the establishment of that group, and one of the areas we will be looking at is the cost of disability payment. I intend to bring…

The wage subsidy scheme is a key disability employment support provided by my Department. It aims to encourage employers to offer substantial and sustainable employment to disabled people through a subsidy. As the Deputy knows, the employee must work at least 15 hours per week for the employer to qualify for the scheme. The subsidy is payable for a maximum of 39 hours per week. The base subsidy ra…