Committee Reports > List of Committees > Seanad > 1966 > Select Committee on Statutory Instruments > Report No. 02 - Statutory Instruments

APPENDIX VIII.

Institutional Assistance Regulations, 1965 [S.I. No. 177 of 1965].

An Rúnaí,

An Roinn Sláinte.

I am directed by the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments to refer to the explanatory note appended to the Institutional Assistance Regulations, 1965 (S.I. No. 177 of 1965) and to suggest that the note conveys nothing that is not obvious from the instrument itself.

It seems to the Committee that the changes being made by the instrument are to increase from 10/- to £1 the minimum weekly income which an inmate of an institution may enjoy without becoming liable for a contribution towards the cost of his maintenance and treatment and also to allow for the deduction of certain expenses in assessing the income. If this is correct the Committee cannot see what objection there can be to saying so. It would welcome the observations of your Department in the matter.

Cléireach an Roghchoiste.

16 Nollaig, 1965.

I am directed by the Minister for Health to refer to your minute of 16 Nollaig, 1965 on the Institutional Assistance Regulations, 1965 (S.I. No. 177 of 1965). The Minister arranged for the actual changes made by these Regulations to be publicised when they were made by a press statement, a copy of which is attached. He does not consider that a statement such as this needed to be embodied in the explanatory note printed with the text of the Regulations. The new Article 12 is self-explanatory and the content of the regulation which it replaced is of no essential interest to a current reading of the regulations.

In general, the Minister would not regard it as desirable that a practice should be established of endeavouring in explanatory notes to compare in detail the content of amending regulations with that of the amended instrument. While in this present instance this would be simple enough, such a note would be extremely complex where the amending regulations were long. The explanatory note should basically be designed to indicate what the law is after the commencement of the instrument to which it refers: a comparison of an instrument with its predecessor can, in the Minister’s view, be most suitably made by following his practice of issuing a separate statement when the instrument is made.

P. Ó MUIREADAIGH.

DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH

The following statement has been issued by the Government Information Bureau on behalf of the Minister for Health:—

At present persons maintained in county homes are allowed to keep 10/- a week, for their own personal needs, out of whatever income they have. In future this amount will be increased to £1 a week, as promised by the Minister for Health in Dáil Éireann on 1 June, 1965. The Minister has now made regulations to this effect. The new regulations will also allow such persons to retain sufficient income to meet commitments for fixed charges such as rent, rates, mortgages, hire purchase payments, etc.

The Minister for Health has also made regulations increasing the present maximum infectious diseases allowance by 10/- a week for a person with an adult dependant, and by 5/- a week in the case of a person without an adult dependant, and increasing the maximum allowance payable to certain disabled persons, by 10/- a week.

All these regulations (which are known as the Institutional Assistance Regulations, 1965, the Infectious Diseases (Maintenance) Regulations, 1965 and the Disabled Persons (Maintenance Allowances) (Amendment) Regulations, 1965) come into operation on the 1st August, 1965.

4th August, 1965.