Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

156. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection what studies have been done by her Department of the international experience of individual social welfare payments; whether she intends introducing further individualised social welfare payments here; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [32073/23]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

There have been a series of reports that have contained recommendations in relation to how our social welfare system could be individualised.

The Commission on Taxation and Welfare recommended that further social welfare individualisation is necessary, specifically in relation to qualified adults whose partners are in receipt of means-tested social assistance benefits. In preparing this recommendation, the Commission had regard to the recent work by NESC and the report of the Citizens Assembly on Gender Equality.

The Commission recommendation builds on the commitment in the Roadmap for Social Inclusion to examine the feasibility of individualising welfare payments, through the provision of a direct payment to the second ‘dependent’ adult in a household, with a view to reducing co-dependency and improving employment and earnings outcomes.

The department is currently examining the possible introduction of pay-related jobseeker's benefit on an invidualised basis and is also working on working age payment reform. Further research will be carried out on this issue examination of payment systems in other countries will form part of this assessment.