State Pensions
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-24
============================================================

Dara Calleary (FF), Mayo

The Social Welfare Act 1997 legislated for changes in the minimum number of paid contributions. The number increased to 520 in April 2012. The homemakers scheme allowed time spent caring for children under 12 since 1994 to be disregarded in the divisor of the yearly average method of calculation. Home caring periods were introduced for those who reached State pension age after September 2012. They can be awarded from any time, including pre-1994. Each of the pension caring supports is specific to the method of calculation but we have to ensure equality, and there is a concern that if pre-2012 pensioners were also allowed to avail of the total contributions approach, including home caring periods, their arrangements would be significantly more generous than those of post-2012 pensioners. I am happy to engage with the Deputy if she has specific cases, so we can give her a more detailed response. We are very focused on the sustainability of the pension fund going forward but we do want to acknowledge those who spent time away from the workforce in a caring capacity. I am anxious, within the context of sustainability, that people do not lose out and about the need for fairness for every pensioner.

---

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/2026-09-24/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:50+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-24