Carers face battle for entitlements

“MY mother often says to me would you not be better off putting me into a home, I’m too much of a burden on you. We don’t want to do that because that is the end of the road.”

The words of Martin Cullen, a 47-year-old Dubliner who has been looking after his mother full-time for the past nine years – and who said his battle to provide for her is not getting any easier.

His mother, Peg, in her 80s, had a stroke a decade ago and requires full-time care.

Mr Cullen told the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance and the Public Service yesterday he and other carers felt like they were devalued when their prime aim was to look after the person they love. He referred to “horrendous problems” with getting a hoist so as to lift his mother in and out of bed.

He was also told to wait up to eight months for a grant to re-fit the bathroom. Not being able to wait, he had to take out a credit union loan.

“In everything we are trying to do we are fighting to get our entitlements,” he said, adding that many carers were afraid to admit the frustration and sadness they sometimes feel because they do not want to look as though they cannot cope.

At the committee meeting the Carers Association said its 161,000 family carers were saving the state more than €2.8 billion a year, yet were struggling to access respite care and grants and prone to depression. Some 43,321 carers were in receipt of the Carers Allowance last year, although it is understood the Department of Social and Family Affairs has issued a number of letters demanding money back from carers it alleges were overpaid due to not following scheme guidelines.

Yesterday’s meeting also heard there had been a surge in the number of claims for the allowance being rejected, with the increase attributed to the growing numbers losing their jobs – in 229 cases it was because of the Habitual Residency Clause.

Sean Dillon of the Carers Association said the government needed to prioritise their members in terms of remuneration, tax breaks for equipment and the publication of the National Carers Strategy, among other measures.

Meanwhile, the Money Advice and Budgeting Service (MABS) told the committee an “out-of-court” approach is the only way to deal with debtors who cannot pay what they owe.

“The legal process is harsh, costly and in our view, unproductive for those who cannot pay through no fault of their own,” Annmarie O’Connor of MABS said.

Credit card companies, meanwhile, have been placing debtors under “inordinate pressure” and “instances of harassment”, which he said could lead to “drastic consequences” for vulnerable people.