Sinn Féin: Diet Allowance Starved of Funding

national | rights, freedoms and repression | press release Saturday March 08, 2008 11:10 by Cael - Sinn Féin Poblachtach

Low income famlies hit

People on a special diet allowance are being short changed
by the Department of Social and Family Affairs because
their entitlement has not increased for the past ten years,
a spokesman for Sinn Féin Poblachtach said today.

DIET ALLOWANCE STARVED OF FUNDING

People on a special diet allowance are being short changed
by the Department of Social and Family Affairs because
their entitlement has not increased for the past ten years,
a spokesman for Republican Sinn Féin said today.

Joe Lynch from Ballinacurra Weston in Limerick, the
vice-chairman of the Munster RSF Executive said that
the dietary allowance is aimed at people whose health
requires them to purchase special foods.

While basic social welfare allowance generally rise
the fact is the dietary supplement has remained
static for the past number of years.

Successive budgets have ignored the allowance
yet the price of special foods such as low fat and
gluten free produce are rising all the time.

The people on the dietary allowance are surely
also entitled to have their entitlements increase
in line with inflation.

It seems to me that the department is trying to
ease out these special allowances and place the
burden on already financially strained men and
women.

The dietary allowance is vital to many men and
women on low incomes and it should be reviewed
urgently and a significant increase allocated to the fund.

(Ends)
Issued on Friday 7th March 2008