Social Welfare Appeal G0009

One Parent Family Payment. Appeal allowed. Year of Appeals Officer’s decision: 2007. The Appellant was a single parent with sole custody of her son. In 2006 she applied for and was refused One Parent Family Payment for the following reason: “you do not have the main care of your son”. The Appellant, to allow her go to work, had arranged that her mother would mind her child while she was at work. As the Appellant’s mother lived in a different town, about an hour and a half’s drive from the Appellant’s town, the child lived with the Appellant’s mother for a number of days of the week. The Deciding Officer decided that the living arrangements were such that the child could not be regarded as “normally resident” with the Appellant and therefore was not a “qualified child” for the purpose of the One Parent Family Payment. The Appellant appealed the decision. An oral hearing of the appeal was held. The Appeals Officer allowed the appeal.