Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I will join them in that case.

Dr. Griffin also identified the cliff edges. Fuel allowance eligibility is all or nothing; either you qualify or you do not. We discussed fuel poverty recently in that regard. There are a lot of people who one would reasonably expect to get three quarters or half of the fuel allowance. To follow my point through to its conclusion, to have a properly progressive taxation system there should be less emphasis on means testing. There is an opportunity cost to that obviously and it is money that could conceivably be used for other things, speaking in the abstract. So many things are hung on to the means test, to return to Deputy Ó Cathasaigh's buckeroo point. The household benefits package is exclusively linked to non-insurance based payments for people under the age of 66. People cannot get the household benefits package unless they are on the means-tested payments, even though they may be under financial pressure. We also discussed recently the fact that SEAI grants for free home upgrades are exclusively tied to means-tested payments, even though someone may have made the contributions to qualify and may be on an invalidity pension. The person could conceivably qualify for the means test but has not gone about doing that because the invalidity payment suits the person but then they cannot qualify for the warmer homes scheme because they are on the insurance based payment rather than a means-tested payment.

The point made about an instrument of social policy is really interesting. There are very few examples of that in recent years but there is the example of the rent-a-room scheme. The way in which social welfare policy can be used to encourage particular social ends is an under-explored area. In talking about the carer's allowance and the participation income proposal from Family Carers Ireland, it occurs to me that there is a substantial discussion taking place in Britain on the social care crisis, the difficulty in accessing care and the difficulty in attracting staff to provide that care. We are not having that conversation here yet, and maybe we should be. Are there things that could be done? There are moral reasons but are there strategic reasons to reinforce the carer's allowance system and, to some extent, the carer's benefit system?

While this may not be our witnesses' area of expertise, the recent Green Paper on disability payments, which was discussed, looked at a broad range of elements and the different payments. One of the points made by the disability organisations was that there was a wrongful conflation of the costs of disability with severity of disability. That is a reasonable point. They propose the idea of a cost-of-disability payment. They are talking about a certain income that would be provided to everyone and it could be individualised after that. I do not believe anyone has fully established how exactly to tailor a payment like that, which is a challenge. It is more than a means test but means might come into it to a limited extent. It would also take into account whether people are working, whether there are employment-related costs, if there are travel costs depending on whether the person lives in an urban or rural area, or other considerations particular to the person's disability. There is not yet an understanding of what the mechanics would involve or what that would look like. It may be a second cousin of means testing in that there is a certain individualised element to it. Have the witnesses considered whether that would be feasible and what it might look like?

I may have other questions but there is plenty to be getting on with there.