Social Welfare Code
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-24
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Mark Wall (LAB), Kildare South

The Minister has thoroughly engaged with me on this matter but the issue is the latest figures we have from his Department show nearly 16% of children were refused disability allowance when coming from DCA. That is almost 1,300 children who now have no payment. As the parents of those children regularly tell me, and I am sure other Members, their child's disability has not gone away. It is just they have been unable to prove and qualify for disability allowance. The disabilities their child and loved one has remain and they are still paying for it. They are paying for private services, as we know, though I am not going to go into that today. The problem we have is what to do for those 1,300 children and their families who are now without a payment. As the Minister said, there are more people entitled to DCA and that is good but the figure is only going to grow, so it is a debate we need to have. The vast majority of respondents to our survey said they wished for the age limit to be extended. I hope we can have further discussions on it.

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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