Social Welfare Payments
Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-23
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Dara Calleary (FF), Mayo

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Seanadóir Keogan as ucht an t-ábhar seo a ardú. As the Senator has intimated, it is important to note that individuals are responsible for reporting their income to the Revenue Commissioners. For any Department of Social Protection payment that is taxable, the decision letters clearly state, when the payment is awarded, whether this information is shared with Revenue or whether the customer needs to notify Revenue themselves. It is a general principle of taxation that, in the absence of a specific exemption, all income, from whatever source, is income for tax purposes and this includes amounts paid to an individual by the Department of Social Protection. Responsibility for taxation policy, including the tax treatment of social welfare payments, rests with the Minister for Finance and is administered by the Revenue Commissioners. All payments from the Department of Social Protection are considered taxable unless specifically exempted from income tax.
The legislation governing the taxation of social welfare payments is in sections 19 and 126 of the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997, which was amended in 2018 to clarify which payments are exempt from the charge to tax. It should be noted that these payments are subject to income tax but exempt from the universal social charge and PRSI.
In order that Revenue can ensure that the right amount of income tax is collected in a timely manner, my Department reports details of these taxable payments to it on an ongoing basis. There are currently 20 scheme types on the taxable payments report, with nearly 1 million customers, including those in receipt of State contributory and non-contributory pension, illness benefit and invalidity pension payments.
There are a few very small schemes, with only approximately 18,000 customers in total, that are not yet included in the report. My Department exchanges the taxable payments report with the Revenue Commissioners each week, giving details of the customers. Such data exchanges between the Department and Revenue are permitted under the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005.
Where a person also has an additional source of employment, occupation or pension income, the mechanism used to collect tax due involves reducing the person’s annual tax credits and rate band by the annual amount of their social welfare income. This ensures that the Department of Social Protection payment is paid gross to the recipient, while the salary or pension paid by the employer would have any tax due on both the social welfare payment and the employment deducted from it.
Senior officials in my Department engage regularly with Revenue by means of a joint high-level group that meets to discuss matters of mutual interest. The group is currently in discussions about including those last few taxable social welfare schemes on the taxable payments report.
I endorse the Senator’s remarks on the Revenue Commissioners and their work. I thank her for raising this issue. I will continue to keep in touch with her on it as we progress towards sharing the information.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-23/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:05+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-23