In my question I also asked the Minister if he will request the health board to revert to the procedures used up to 1983 for allocating clothing grants which were changed around this time last year or perhaps earlier, around April 1984, which resulted in a large number of people who up to then were in receipt of clothing grants because of their situation being denied them last year and presumably they will be denied them again this year if the regulations remain the same.

The total amount of money paid out in the country as a whole on supplementary welfare last year was £40 million, half of which was paid out in the Eastern Health Board area. The guidelines are fairly general, and as far as the Department of Social Welfare are concerned we leave it to the health boards to administer the schemes and set out their own criteria within the framework of the general guidelines. We cannot produce guidelines for every eventuality of direct need of families. It would be quite impossible to do so.