THERE’S SOME BIG spending election promises being made by Fine Gael this week, such as abolishing the means tests for carers.

The party’s manifesto, which will be launched on Sunday, will have all eyes on it and its costings, for instance, where the next government will find possibly €2 billion for that specific measure. 

Earlier in the week, Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald accused Simon Harris of being “pretty intent on stealing Sinn Fein’s ideas”, referencing Harris’s announcement of a full review of the means testing for carers’ welfare payments.

“For somebody who talks a lot about new energy and new ideas, Simon Harris actually has no new ideas, and in the absence of ideas of his own, he seems to be pretty intent on stealing Sinn Fein’s ideas,” she said. 

To this, Harris later said “Deputy McDonald can keep her policies. It wasn’t her idea, but it was the idea from carers and my party is in the business of listening and acting.”

For many years, there have been calls for the means test to be scrapped, but successive governments have rebuffed the calls, stating that it would be too expensive. 

There have been criticisms of Fine Gael who have been accused putting things in their manifesto that they said were not achievable when they were in government, such as the VAT reduction for hospitality. Mere weeks ago, during budget talks, the government said such measure could not be done. Similarly, the same was said about means testing of carers.

However, Fine Gael has now moved the dial on it, but questions are being asked about why the measure is now affordable, just two short months after stating that it was not. 

Estimated costings 

In Dáil debate in September on a private members motion on means testing carers, which proposed a roadmap for abolishing the test by 2027, the former junior minister in the Department of Social Protection Joe O’Brien outlined why the government was opposing such a motion. 

He said some 97,406 people are currently supported by this payment, with expenditure on the carer’s allowance scheme estimated to be over €1.1 billion this year. 

O’Brien went on to state the cost of the abolition, according to department officials: 

“Officials in the Department have conservatively estimated that the cost of removing the means test for carer’s allowance would be an additional €600 million per annum, based on current claim numbers, that is, in other words, before adding any new inflow of claims.”

He went on state that according to census data, there are a lot more people that described themselves as ‘carers’ than the official department data of who is receiving the payment already. 

If it is the case that the number of carers is significantly higher high, “it follows that the cost of abolition of the means test is also high”, he said. 

O’Brien went on to state what the department’s estimation is in that case: 

“The Department has costed a potential inflow of the people who self-reported as carers in the census.

Once the inflow is reckoned, the cost estimates rise to between €880 million and €2 billion a year.

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Asked about the party’s spending commitments at the policy launch event in Dublin on Friday, McEntee said the Fine Gael manifesto would demonstrate the costings behind all its proposals.

McEntee was specifically asked about the promise to scrap the means test for carers, stating:

“Everything in our manifesto has been costed.”

Earlier in the week, McEntee and her party colleague, Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe took aim at Fianna Fáil’s manifesto costings, stating they left a lot to be desired.

“As a party, we have been very clear, and I think over the last number of years, we have shown that while we are listening to the concerns of people, while we will do everything that we can to respond to the asks that people have of this government, whether it’s education, whether it’s childcare, whether it’s responding to justice matters, we will provide the support that is needed, while at the same time making sure that we stick within the boundaries and the fiscal rules that we’ve set ourselves,” McEntee said yesterday when quizzed on the costing of the measure. 

“And I think we all know that from Paschal Donohoe (public expenditure minister) that everything that we have put out and set out in our manifesto, which we’ll be publishing on Sunday, that that is costed,” she said. 

A commitment of €2 billion in any manifesto would be considered an absolutely huge deal, but it’s one that will have to be clearly outlined by the party this weekend.