Should Carers allowance be means tested, why is it means tested if all parties agree it shouldn't

There are various estimates on what this would cost.

Parliamentary Budget office - 397 million p.a.

Family Carers Ireland - 389 million p.a

Response by Minister Humphreys to a Parliamentary Question - 1.2 billion p.a.

https://familycarers.ie/media/3116/estimating-the-cost-of-abolishing-the-carer-s-allowance-means-test.pdf

Apart from the cost, the government know that many people will give up their jobs/reduce their hours/impoverish themselves/spend their savings to look after loved ones regardless of whether they get carer's allowance or not - so why bother abolishing the means test.

If the means test were to be abolished, perhaps more people could afford to become carers instead of placing their relatives in nursing homes. Most nursing home are for profit entities funded by the state and residents under the Fair Deal scheme. Would profits be hit if more people were cared for by relatives at home? Can't have that.

Personally, I gave up my job to become a full time carer. Working, even a few hours a week, is completely out of the question. I don't get CA as I fail the means test due to savings. Silly me, saving my money while I was working instead of splurging on rubbish. I get the non means tested carer's support grant, a miserable 1850 euro per year. I estimate that the care I am providing would cost at least 150,000 p.a. if I or the state was paying for it (as with nursing home care, homecare is mostly an outsourced, for profit business) And based on my experience of the sh*tshow that is homecare, the service that would be provided for that 150k would be rubbish.

The very high costs in the media 800m rising to 2bn if new previously unknown cohorts start claiming are one obvious reason. It would be half the social welfare package for the next 5 years.

In addition, is it a good idea? Should welfare not be a safety net rather than something which attempts to "reimburse" for hours cared when you already earn a decent salary?

Finally, we use means testing generally as a means to ensure we can target scare resources at those who need them most. It's a well established tool. Every euro the sw system gives to someone that does.not.require it is a euro that could be better spent elsewhere.

Our social welfare system by and large isn't there to repay people what they pay in.

Most of it is social assistance rather than based on your contributions.

I don't understand how someone who is currently not working (and caring) wouldn't pass the means test as it is.

I hear what you are saying about a 300k bike shed and the money will be wasted on other things but that is an argument that could be made.for absolutely any expenditure increase and doesn't feel comparable to something with a potential cost of 1-2bn.

What spending that money on a proper childcare scheme? We can't have everything, even when individual policy proposals have merit in isolation - we have to make choices.

Most discussion on the means test seems to focus on couples where one of them is a carer and is denied CA because their partner's income puts the couple over the means threshold. That is still not as bad as the situation of a single person with significant savings e.g. me. My caring duties mean I cannot work, even doing a few hours is out of the question. So the 18.5 hours that I'd be permitted to be employed for is useless.

I don't have a partner so no household income from them

The income limit for CA for a single person at the moment is 450 euro per week rising to 625 euro per week next year. Double those figures for a couple.

For capital, the means from it is assessed as follows:
First €50,000 Nil
Next €10,000 €1 per €1,000
Next €10,000 €2 per €1,000
Balance (any capital over €70,000) €4 per €1,000

In other words, if a single person has 220k in savings, their means from that is assessed as 630 euro per week which is over even the 2025 limit for CA.

Try generating 630 euro per week return from a 220k investment and see how you get on - clearly the DSP expects a person in this situation to spend their capital.

I wouldn't even mind the means test for CA if this state provided good care in the community to the people that need it. It doesn't, public services are in a heap.

Public health nursing, occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech and language therapy, GPs, dentistry - shambles.

Homecare - an unregulated shambles with widespread abuse and probable fraud happening due to the HSE outsourcing services to private providers and then being too incompetent/under-resourced to manage the contracts.

Nursing homes - waiting lists, greed, residents charged for services not delivered, sexual and financial abuse, residents left hungry, constant non compliances with regulations. Recent example, Bushfield Care Centre in Oranmore that among other problems had no hot water to wash residents because they got their gas cutoff due to non payment of utility bills.

Seeing as nobody apparently gives a fcuk about elderly and vulnerable people, pay those people who do care i.e. family members who have given up their jobs or severely reduced their hours to provide care that the state is incapable of providing.

It was just promises by various parties.