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Cross-border 'Dole Tourists' fleecing Welfare System in Ireland
02-01-2009 11:04 am - John Drennan - Sunday Independent
THE dole has replaced pig and diesel-smuggling as the latest lucrative cross-border venture for the less law-abiding wing of Northern Ireland's citizenry, according to a TD.

Donegal Fine Gael TD Joe McHugh has claimed that huge numbers of unemployed Northern Ireland residents are "flocking across the Border'' to take advantage of the Republic's generous unemployment benefit system.

Mr McHugh said that whilst unemployment was rising rapidly, concern has been growing in Donegal about "unusual patterns of dole claimants'' in certain towns. He claimed the narrowing gap in the values of sterling and the euro "played a major role in the rise of dole tourism''.

So far, the most high-profile consequence of this has been a cross-border exodus of Irish shoppers to Newry. However, as unemployment escalates in the North and the Republic, McHugh said "Donegal and the border counties are experiencing the phenomenon of dole shopping''.

Even prior to the decline in the value of sterling, Irish welfare rates of €205 a week for a single man were significantly more generous than the British rate of £60 (€68).

Mr McHugh noted that "the exchange rate offers a real incentive'' to fraudsters. He said the "current lax regulation'' means "fellows who are living in Derry can get the address of a cousin in Donegal and a utility bill, claim away and go back home across the Border'.'

The TD also called on the Government to tackle this new "double sterling whammy where Irish jobs and taxes are being lost to the North and Irish taxpayers are subsidising the North's welfare system''.

Social and Family Affairs Minister Mary Hanafin confirmed the problem was so serious it had been raised at a formal meeting of the North-South Ministerial Council by her SDLP counterpart Margaret Ritchie.

The minister also noted that this activity "wasn't confined to Donegal but was a feature of all border counties''.

She also said: "We were always conscious of the problem because our rates have always been more generous, but the collapse of the sterling differential poses a new challenge to everyone to be even more vigilant.''



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