Social Welfare Benefits
Dail Éireann — 2026-04-30
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Colm Burke (FG), Cork North-Central

Where I am coming from is the context of people who are living on their own. One of the big problems that we have where a person is living on their own is that there are additional costs. The cost of heating a house and normal maintenance is the same as it would be if there were two or three people living in the house. If we look at the allowance that the Department is paying out and the cost to the State where a person ends up in a nursing home, the average cost in a nursing home as a minimum now is €1,250 per week. Therefore, if we look at the overall cost in real terms, there are challenges for people, particularly in rural areas, who are living on their own trying to make ends meet. The cost of heating, especially in older houses, is a huge additional cost. It is something that needs to be looked at. The cost of administration is taking up a lot of money. If the allowance was already there for anyone over 70 years of age, that would reduce down the cost of administration.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-30/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:49+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-30