The Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Ms Coughlan, is to amend the Social Welfare Bill to protect those with personal retirement savings accounts.
She said that the amendment would be for the benefit of consumers and would protect people from being enticed out of one perfectly good pension product into another. She added: "The proposal will facilitate the taking of powers to make relevant regulations."
Introducing the second stage of the Bill, Ms Coughlan said that there had been a massive increase in spending on social welfare - from the equivalent of €5.7 billion in 1997 to over €10 billion this year. There had been significant increases in child benefit rates, resulting in the rates of payment being more than three times those payable in 1997.
Ms Coughlan said that there had been real increases in social welfare pensions, with old-age contributory pensioners now receiving €157.30 per week compared to the equivalent of €99 in 1997.
The Bill drew strong criticism from the Opposition.
The Fine Gael spokesman on social and family affairs, Mr Michael Ring, sharply criticised the deal done by the Government with the dentists. The losers, he said, were those people who had paid their PRSI to the State.
"I am appalled by the deal. It was a bad day for the PRSI workers, a bad day for the Government, a bad day for the country. The only people who are smiling tonight are the dentists," he said.
The Labour Party spokesman on social and family affairs, Mr Willie Penrose, said that the whole country could now see that the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, had given in the Budget with one hand only to take away with the other.
"Ireland's domestic inflation is double the EU average by virtue of the Minister's profligacy and recklessness in previous years, when times were good," he said. "It is this inflationary increase that completely dissipates the social welfare increases in this Social Welfare Bill. Indeed, many social welfare recipients, as the Society of St Vincent de Paul acknowledges, will be worse off as a result of the recent budgetary and social welfare measures.
"For example, all of the Budget increases for many social welfare recipients will be clawed back by the changes in rent supplements, which have rightly been condemned by housing groups and community welfare officers."
Mr Dan Boyle (Green Party, Cork South Central) said that there were worrying trends in health and education inflation, adding: "These are two vital areas of life for many people depending on the social welfare system."
Dr Jerry Cowley (Independent, Mayo) said that those who worked for the Department of Social Welfare were very courteous, but recipients had to face a huge level of bureaucracy.
Debate on the Bill is due to resume today.
