Discretionary powers ‘used to avoid giving benefits’

The ombudsman has said government departments, especially the Department of Social Protection, are using discretionary powers to avoid granting benefits and are adding to the trauma experienced by many families.

Launching her annual report for 2011, Emily O’Reilly said the increase in the number of people seeking benefits had meant an increase in inquiries to the ombudsman’s office, mostly due to delays or denial of payments.

In particular, the granting of the carer’s allowance and domiciliary care allowance appears to have become more discretionary, she said, and the refusal of the payments is not always evidence-based or consistent.

“People who might have got particular allowances a few years ago are now being denied it,” she said, referring in particular to cases where the domicilary allowance was not provided to parents of autistic children.

She said public bodies may be using situations where there is an element of judgment or discretion as a way of squeezing benefits.

“You could argue that they were too laissez-faire in the past, but that is not the claimant’s fault.”

She said last year had been the busiest ever for her office, although the number of complaints received, at 3,602, was slightly below the record figure in 2010.

The 11,541 enquiries received was a 23% increase, while the office dealt with 4,220 complaints in 2011 — up 38% on 2010.

The number of complaints received regarding the Department of Social Protection accounted for almost one third of all complaints, with local authorities accounting for 27.7% and the HSE 24.4%.

On the issue of another benefit, the mobility allowance, the ombudsman’s office found that while the department has accepted, following a case supported by the ombudsman, that its policy of not granting it to people over the age of 66 was in breach of the Equal Status Act, it had still not revised the law some 16 months later.

The department told Ms O’Reilly it was a government decision, but she said “we are not entirely convinced”. claiming there was “no ambiguity” and that the Government may be trying to “trim back the allowance before they open the floodgates”.

Ms O’Reilly said she would be contacting public bodies and asking them to “raise their game” given the number of cases where citizens contacted her office because their case had not been properly dealt with or communicated to the applicant. Follow-up efforts by the ombudsman’s office usually succeeded in action but Ms O’Reilly said such efforts were “a waste of resources of this office”.

She said there were signs that the long-awaited amendment to the Ombudsman Amendment Bill, which would allow more bodies to come under its scope, would take place, hopefully in the next year.

* www.ombudsman.gov.ie