Social Welfare Act, 1993
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Distribution of assets. |
34.—(1) The personal representative of a person who was at any time in receipt of assistance shall, not less than three months before commencing to distribute the assets of that person— | |
(a) inform the Minister, by notice in writing delivered to the Minister, of his intention to distribute the assets, and provide the Minister with a schedule of the assets of the estate, and | ||
(b) if requested in writing by the Minister within three months of the furnishing of the notice and schedule of assets referred to in paragraph (a), ensure that sufficient assets are retained, to the extent (if any) appropriate, to repay any sum which may be determined to be due to the Minister or the State (as the case may be) in respect of— | ||
(i) payment of assistance to the person at a time when the person was not entitled to receive such assistance, or | ||
(ii) payment of assistance to the person of an amount in excess of the amount which the person was entitled to receive. | ||
(2) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, for the purposes of determining the sum which is due to the Minister under subsection (1), the means of the deceased person for the period in respect of which assistance was paid to him shall, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, be calculated on the basis that his assets at the time of his death belonged to him for that entire period. | ||
(3) A personal representative who contravenes subsection (1) and who distributes the assets of the person whose estate he represents without payment of any sum which is due to the Minister in respect of— | ||
(a) payments of assistance to the person at a time when the person was not entitled to receive such assistance, or | ||
(b) payments of assistance to the person of amounts in excess of the amounts which the person was entitled to receive, | ||
shall be personally liable to repay to the Minister an amount equal to the amount (if any) which the Minister would have received if, in the administration of the estate of the person, the sum aforesaid had been duly taken into account and repaid to the Minister to the extent (if any) appropriate, having regard to the assets of the person, and such amount shall be a debt due by the personal representative to the Minister. | ||
(4) Any proceedings to recover assistance due to the Minister as a debt due to the State under subsection (3) of section 300F of the Principal Act (inserted by section 31 of this Act) shall be maintainable against the estate of a deceased person if brought at any time within the period of two years commencing on the date on which the notice and the schedule of assets under paragraph (a) of subsection (1) is received by the Minister or within any other period fixed in any other enactment, whichever is the longer. | ||
(5) The Principal Act is hereby amended by the repeal of— | ||
(a) subsections (3), (3A), (3B) (inserted by section 33 of the Act of 1991) and (4) of section 174, and | ||
(b) subsection (11) (inserted by section 34 of the Act of 1991) of section 169. |