Submission 297

May 08

Green Paper Submission

I am a woman and I am 60 years of age. I have spent a large part of my life in caring duties, mainly childcare and eldercare, this is my story.

I began working in 1963, I then got a job in the Civil Service and I worked there from 1965 to 1977. I got married in 1977 and then I had to leave my job because of the Marriage Bar. I felt this was very unfair but because this was the norm in Ireland nobody questioned it, we just did it and got on with life.

I was at home rearing my young children and working with my husband on the farm. My husband was also working outside of the farm. Work on the farm was extremely hard. We had dry stock and needed to get up really early to check the animals. This had to be done morning and evening in all weathers. As part of this work I also did all the administration, for example, keeping records and returns to the revenue. It entailed juggling my time between children and farm work.

In 1989 I began to care for my mother-in-law. I applied for the carers allowance but didn’t meet the means test and was refused. I continued to apply for six years and eventually got it. Circumstances had changed; my mother-in-law needed more care so my husband gave up his job and got more involved in the day-to-day running of the farm in order to allow me to give more care to his mother. I cared for her until 2006.

During this time I assumed I was gaining credits while on carer’s allowance. Nobody told me different and this was not stated anywhere in the documents In 2006 I went to my local social welfare office to see how many contributions I had. I was shocked to discover I did not qualify for credits as I did not have paid contributions at the date of applying for the carer’s allowance.

I am so angry with the Social Welfare System. I believed all the time I was caring I was contributing towards my pension. Nobody told me about the Homemaker’s Scheme in 1994, I could have registered! I could be eligible for my pension. I would like to see the system take women like me into account. Caring should be recognised and credited. After all, I cared for sixteen years and this was not easy work. I would like to see full credits given to all people on carers allowance and those in receipt of child benefit allowance.

I am totally disgusted with the system which does not entitle me to a full Contributory Pension after a lifetime of fully contributing to Irish society.