Carer's Leave Eligibility
Dail Éireann — 2025-12-16
============================================================

Marian Harkin (IND), Sligo-Leitrim

I have a further response here reiterating all of what I said. To be honest with the Deputy, I know he does not want to hear it. Nonetheless, that is my role and responsibility this evening. The Deputy talked about bureaucracy, but it is also the law. He is an expert in this area where I am not, but perhaps the law is what needs changing and not so much the bureaucracy or how the law is implemented. As I said, the employer of all school staff is the individual school board or the board of management which manages the schools on behalf of patron bodies. The Department is not the employer. The carer's leave scheme is regulated by the Carer's Leave Act 2001, as amended. In line with the Act, the eligibility criteria for carer's leave includes the requirement for an employee to have been employed for a period of 12 months' continuous employment with their current employer.
The Deputy has made the specific circumstances in this case very clear. As I said, I will bring it to the attention of the Minister, if the Deputy wants to speak to me afterwards or tomorrow. I am not saying I can do anything, but I will make sure this message is clearly brought. I will not read any more of what I have in front of me. I do not think it would be helpful.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-16/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:28+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-16