Savings of €135m if child benefit linked to school attendance - TD

Replacing child benefit with a school attendance payment could save the exchequer up to €135 million and cut absenteeism, it was claimed in the Dáil.

Independent TD Denis Naughten said one in 10 primary school children and one in six secondary school children missed more than 20 days of school annually - one eighth of the secondary school year. Last year 1,500 children also left school early.

Citing the example of a six-year-old girl, Jenny, he said her school principal contacted the National Educational Welfare Board after she had missed 65 days of school. The education welfare officer repeatedly contacted the family but eventually the case ended up in court where the father was fined €300 and the mother €200. The child has attended school since the court case “but it should not have cost the taxpayer nearly €24,000 and Jenny a year of school before action was taken”.

The former Fine Gael TD claimed that if child benefit for school-age children was replaced with a payment linked to school attendance it would also have a significant impact on child benefit fraud and over-claims. “Not only would this keep children in school it would also save the exchequer €100 million to €135 million annually.”

Mr Naughten said however “this proposal would be a fraud-prevention measure while also helping to address truancy and cutting down on bureaucracy, rather than focusing solely on stopping the €13.2 million paid annually for children living elsewhere”.

He believed it would address EU legal issues but “would also meet some of the criteria laid down by the European Central Bank and Ireland’s’ EU targets for reducing red tape and streamlining government”.

The Roscommon-South Leitrim TD said the department’s control division saved up to €85 million a year in child benefit and a further €5 million on overpayments. The new system would cut child benefit fraud and overpayments of between €10.5 million and €36 million.

Minister of State Alex While said however that linking child benefit to school attendance was superfluous because it was already a statutory requirement. "The requirement for school attendance for children in receipt of child benefit is already a strong feature of both education and social protection policy."

Speaking on behalf of Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton, Mr White said child benefit is paid for some 1.15 million children, with an estimated expenditure of approximately €1.9 billion. "EU nationals who come to work in Ireland, and who pay Irish social insurance contributions, are entitled to receive child benefit in respect of their children, even if the children reside in another EU member state."

He pointed out that the department saved €106 million in child benefit in 2010 from “control activity”, €85 million in 2011 and €83 million in 2012 with €54 million to date this year.

Stressing that school attendance for children in receipt of child benefit was already a strong feature of education and social protection policy, the Minister said “in the absence of any evidence that the existing statutory arrangements are inadequate, a further measure to link child benefit and school attendance would be an unnecessary duplication”.

But Mr Naughten said he was talking about replacing the current social welfare system with a national education welfare system, “so it is not a duplication but a reduction in bureaucracy”.

He claimed the Department of Social Protection "is abdicating its responsibility because these children are not attending school. Why are we continuing to pay child benefit to them?"

Mr Naughten said principals around the country “can tell us that some parents are not prepared to get up in the morning and get their children out to school. However if there was a financial impact, their attitude would change.”

He added: “Let us make sure that we send out a clear message that there is a responsibility to attend school and that if children do not, we will hit the parents in the pocket.”

Mr White told him the proposal was worthy of debate but “would not be without controversy” and he did not believe it would receive universal approval.