While I welcome the supports available to older people, there is a growing concern that the social welfare system does not address the additional costs associated with advancing age. What I am asking the Tánaiste to examine, in the context of budget 2027, is additional supports for older people, particularly those over the age of 80 and 90. I am particularly thinking about the fuel allowance. We have 189,000 people over the age of 80 and 29,000 over the age of 90 but not all have an automatic entitlement to the fuel allowance. It is those cohorts of people who are particularly vulnerable to fuel poverty. As I said, only 29,000 people are over the age of 90. Most of them are already in receipt of the fuel allowance but there is a small cohort who are not because they are above the financial threshold. It would be a great step by the Government to consider an automatic entitlement for those people over the age of 90, perhaps first, and then extending it to those over the age of 80.

Sentiment score: 0.13