Social Welfare Eligibility

Thursday, 24 September 2026

Questions (83)

Peadar Tóibín

Question:

83. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of persons holding a free travel pass on 31 August 2026, by qualifying category including State pension, disability allowance, invalidity pension, blind pension and carer's allowance recipients; the beneficiaries of temporary protection from Ukraine, where applicable, international protection applicants, where applicable, and all other qualifying categories; and the estimated cost to the Exchequer of providing free travel under each category in each of the past five years. [67316/26]

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Written answers

Minister for Social Protection

As of 31 August 2026, a total of 1,180,276 recipients held a free travel pass. The breakdown by qualifying scheme is provided in the table below:

Scheme	Number of Recipients
Blind Persons Pension	883
Carers Allowance	81,393
Deserted Wifes Benefit	2,913
Disability Allowance	175,120
Free Travel Only	150,696
Incapacity Supplement	497
Invalidity Pension	50,933
Jobseekers Transitional Payment	61
Occupational Injuries Pension	540
One Parent Family Payment	217
Partial Capacity Benefit	2,366
State Pension Contributory	516,535
State Pension Non Contributory	100,909
Bereaved Partner’s (Contributory) Pension	97,016
Bereaved Partner’s (Non-Contributory) Pension	197
TOTAL	1,180,276

As of the 31 August, there were 12,280 recipients of the Free Travel scheme who were beneficiaries of temporary protection from Ukraine.

The annual expenditure for the Free Travel scheme for each of the last 5 years is provided in the table below in millions of euro. Expenditure is reported at the scheme level and we are unable to break down expenditure by the qualifying category for recipients.

-	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Expenditure (€million)	91.27	89.57	92.58	96.62	102.45