I will keep pursuing the ‘Granny Grant’: Ross
INDEPENDENT Alliance minister Shane Ross has defended his proposed ‘granny grant’ and insisted he plans to pursue it.
Some Fine Gael ministers have described it as a “mad proposal” but Mr Ross claimed he hadn’t seen “any push-back at all”.
The proposed scheme would give grandparents who mind their grandchildren for more than 10 hours a week a €1,000 payment.
Mr Ross has suggested it could be paid out to other relatives or more than one grandparent per child.
However, despite being floated by the Alliance previously, the proposal has not been costed.
Mr Ross said it was not rejected previously but submitted “too late” to be considered fully. He defended not costing it in the meantime, saying it would be by Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe and there were a number of issues to be thrashed out.
Negotiating
Mr Ross said it had been well received by the public, adding: “We’re going to pursue this as an idea, as a novel idea and we’re going to continue to push for this – an idea which I think recognises the role that grandparents play in child-minding.”
Asked if the exclusion of the grant from the Budget would be a resigning issue, he said: “We don’t talk in terms of red line issues, I think that’s unhelpful when you’re negotiating the Budget.”
He said the Alliance has submitted a wide range of proposals to the Government pre-Budget and will be happy if a large number of them are included.
Mr Ross estimates the grant would cost around €71m based on an estimation that there are around 70,000 grandparents who would be entitled to the grant.
However, senior officials in the Department of Finance have expressed concern that the grant could cost “many hundreds of millions of euro” to introduce and administer.