Plan for single welfare payment due in March

PLANS on implementing a single social welfare payment will be presented to the troika by the end of March.

Senior officials in the Department of Social Protection yesterday said the submission was still being worked on and would need to include “medium-term” timeframes for implementation of a new single payment.

Speaking prior to the joint Oireachtas committee on jobs, social protection and education, department deputy secretary Anne Vaughan said one possibility was that any new single social assistance payment would apply only to new entrants.