There are commitments in the programme for Government with regard to improving services provided to citizens by State Departments. I am again raising the issue of carer's allowance. We carried out an audit of the applications we have processed in our office and not only is it taking 18 or 19 weeks for the first application to be processed but, because families are making applications in a hurry as they need to make decisions on care for their loved ones, these applications may have to be reviewed, which then takes 17 weeks. Applications are now taking a total of 35 weeks to be processed in some cases. This is totally and absolutely unacceptable. In light of this being carers' week and everything that has been said this week regarding home helps and so on, the Government has to take seriously the crisis in respect of processing carer's allowance applications for genuine people who seek to care for their loved ones in their homes. It behoves the Government to do something about it.

The Minister has been making efforts to simplify the forms and to improve the response times. She has reported some progress on both, although she has acknowledged that the waiting time continues to be very long. The Department will continue to bring that time down. Extra resources have been put in to manage that. From dealing with this issue I am conscious, as are most Deputies, that the application is complex. Not only is there a means test but there are also a health test and an assessment of the applicants, their working patterns, and the distance they live from the person for whom they care. We have created a very complex provision and it does create difficulties for both applicants and those processing applications. I hope the efforts to simplify the process are successful. I recognise the difficulty the Deputy raises.