Probe after 'unexplained' surge in people claiming disability allowance

Brendan Burgess

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Probe after 'unexplained' surge in people claiming disability allowance

Interesting article in today's Indo


In an exclusive piece in today’s Irish Independent, Charlie Weston writes that in the past 10 years there has been a jump of more than 42,000 getting the payments.

As it stands, there are 126,000 in receipt of the disability allowance - a 50pc rise from 10 years ago.

...

Some of the increase is explained by changes in medical assessment, as well as demographic changes - but many recipients are young.

There are concerns that a minority of disability cheats are skewing the figures and claiming taxpayers' money.

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform recently produced a report calling for further investigation of the matter.
 
One factor may be that we have better mental health services than we had 10 years ago and a diagnosis of that type can qualify someone for disability payments.
 
As far as I know disability allowance (which any of us could need to avail of) comes from PRSI. However I don't think you need to have made any PRSI payments to avail of it?

I remember in another thread I asked why our PRSI fund was being drained when our COAP and unemployment benefit didn't get that close to the overall figure being paid into PRSI. They answer some poster gave was disability.

If there is large scale abuse of disability then it'd be one of the reasons that COAP pension age is being delayed and payment levels impossible to predict.

Perhaps it would be better if disability was only covered by PRSI for some fixed period and then was moved to welfare.
The advantage would be that the government feels welfare expenditure is their money and they'd be more likely to try to ensure fraud is kept at low levels, once it's coming from PRSI I feel that's less likely to be the case.
 
So if you end up paralyzed you need to get better before your disability runs out?

Maybe we just need to reallocate SW staff to make sure cases are genuine and send people to prison who make blatantly false claims.
 
I suspect some of it is people who spent all of there life working watching other people gaming the system and paying extra tax because of Legitimate loopholes are sick of it ,

They now have an underlying medical problem so it is now there turn to use what they see as a legitimate loophole in the system

We don't frown on Legitimate loopholes when people are in a position to get professional help to avail of the loophole or is that only for some people,

I would also say the raising of the pension age is not helping where as person is finding it hard because of age to continue working same with someone with an underline medical condition having to stop working before the new retirement age kicks in,

If you cant beat them you might as well join in. We need to be on our guard and make sure we are fair to the people who go out to work every day if we don't we will pay the price ,

You can feel it if you look back at how some posters are changing there position on this site,
 
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As far as I know disability allowance (which any of us could need to avail of) comes from PRSI. However I don't think you need to have made any PRSI payments to avail of it?

I remember in another thread I asked why our PRSI fund was being drained when our COAP and unemployment benefit didn't get that close to the overall figure being paid into PRSI. They answer some poster gave was disability.

If there is large scale abuse of disability then it'd be one of the reasons that COAP pension age is being delayed and payment levels impossible to predict.

Perhaps it would be better if disability was only covered by PRSI for some fixed period and then was moved to welfare.
The advantage would be that the government feels welfare expenditure is their money and they'd be more likely to try to ensure fraud is kept at low levels, once it's coming from PRSI I feel that's less likely to be the case.

Disability Allowance is not paid from the Social Insurance Fund.
Illness Benefit and Invalidity Pension are paid from the Social Insurance Fund, based on PRSI contributions.
 
Thanks for that clarification, that would make more sense.
Disability Allowance is not paid from the Social Insurance Fund.
Illness Benefit and Invalidity Pension are paid from the Social Insurance Fund, based on PRSI contributions.
 
Another factor is that the article points to the jump being "in the last ten years".


welfare.ie

Qualifying Conditions in Summary
To qualify for a Disability Allowance a person must:

  • Have an injury, disease or physical or mental disability that has continued or may be expected to continue for at least one year
  • As a result of this disability be substantially restricted in undertaking work that would otherwise be suitable for a person of your age, experience and qualifications
  • be aged between 16 and under 66
  • satisfy a means test
  • be habitually resident in the State

I'm wondering, just as an observation, is part of the reason down to reduced working hours for people resulting in reduced income that then qualifies them for the allowance.
In other words, they may have already registered the disability but when times were good, they were still capable of holding down a full-time job that disqualified them from the allowance by virtue of their income?

Over the last ten years, when times were tight, and hours reduced, and pay reduced, is it possible that, given their disability and reduced income they now qualified for the allowance through the means test?

Perhaps in ten years from now, the same report will show a decrease in the claims due to the up-turn in employment?

In any case, it is right that it is investigated.
 
Another factor is that the article points to the jump being "in the last ten years".


welfare.ie

Qualifying Conditions in Summary
To qualify for a Disability Allowance a person must:

  • Have an injury, disease or physical or mental disability that has continued or may be expected to continue for at least one year
  • As a result of this disability be substantially restricted in undertaking work that would otherwise be suitable for a person of your age, experience and qualifications
  • be aged between 16 and under 66
  • satisfy a means test
  • be habitually resident in the State

I'm wondering, just as an observation, is part of the reason down to reduced working hours for people resulting in reduced income that then qualifies them for the allowance.
In other words, they may have already registered the disability but when times were good, they were still capable of holding down a full-time job that disqualified them from the allowance by virtue of their income?

Over the last ten years, when times were tight, and hours reduced, and pay reduced, is it possible that, given their disability and reduced income they now qualified for the allowance through the means test?

Perhaps in ten years from now, the same report will show a decrease in the claims due to the up-turn in employment?

In any case, it is right that it is investigated.
Investigating it is the easy part more than likely they will create a bigger mess by the time they are finished,
 
Finian McGrath, Junior Minister, was on about this yesterday on radio. He reckons it's all down to better diagnosis and it being done earlier. Simple as that. And he was very happy that people are getting what they are entitled (that great Irish word) to when before they weren't.
There's no mention in that Indo article linked at the start but apparently we are well ahead v's the rest of the OECD.

It's a great way of getting away from job seekers and those (occasional) pesky interviews/follow ups to see how the job hunt is going!
 
As far as I know disability allowance (which any of us could need to avail of) comes from PRSI. However I don't think you need to have made any PRSI payments to avail of it?

I remember in another thread I asked why our PRSI fund was being drained when our COAP and unemployment benefit didn't get that close to the overall figure being paid into PRSI. They answer some poster gave was disability.

If there is large scale abuse of disability then it'd be one of the reasons that COAP pension age is being delayed and payment levels impossible to predict.

Perhaps it would be better if disability was only covered by PRSI for some fixed period and then was moved to welfare.
The advantage would be that the government feels welfare expenditure is their money and they'd be more likely to try to ensure fraud is kept at low levels, once it's coming from PRSI I feel that's less likely to be the case.

No.

DA is a means-tested allowance, so it's not based on PRSI, and it is funded out of general tax.

Invalidity Pension IP is a PRSI-based benefit, and it is financed from the SIF.
 
Friends of mine prefer DA to JSA, as they will not be challenged to find work on DA.

That doesn't make sense. One of the conditions of DA is, in part, the recognition that it is more challenging for people with disability to find work.
 
Some CSO disability stats

http://www.cso.ie/en/csolatestnews/...016resultsprofile9-healthdisabilityandcarers/

13.5% of entire population recorded as having a disability

Age U20 6.7% up from 6% in 2011
Up to one in ten persons below 45 years of age had a disability, rising to 20% by age 60

Educational attainment amongst disabled persons was much lower than that of the general population at all levels. Amongst those aged 15 to 50 (inclusive), 13.7% had completed no higher than primary level education, compared with 4.2% of the general population; 37.0% had completed third level education compared with 53.4% of all those aged 15-50.

There were 176,445 persons with a disability in the labour force, giving a labour force participation rate of 30.2% compared with 61.4% for the population overall.

Of those with a disability aged 15 and over in April 2016 (584,045 people), just 22.3% (130,067) were at work, compared with 53.4% of the overall population in that age group. Overall in April 2016, 6.5% of those at work had a disability.

The unemployment rate amongst persons with a disability was 26.3%, more than double the 12.9% rate for the population as a whole.
 
Without getting into the morality of the issue is the fact that we don't have abortion part of the reason for higher levels of disability?
Do people with Downs Syndrome qualify for disability?
 
That doesn't make sense. One of the conditions of DA is, in part, the recognition that it is more challenging for people with disability to find work.

The people I'm talking about aren't disabled, in the sense that they they do not suffer from an impairment that prevents them from working.

But they don't want to work.

DA means they don't have to look for work, as much as they would have to with JSA.
 
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