Madam, - So the State may be paying pensions to 8,000 deceased people (Carl O'Brien, March 5th).
If so a mere €100 million per annum is being paid out unnecessarily, enough to build and operate 1,000 residential drugs rehabilitation places..
For the last three years I have been in receipt of the old age pension in Ireland and a small pension from France where I worked for two years in the 1960s.
The contrast in controls could not be more stark. Not once have I been contacted by the Irish authorities to confirm my continued existence, whereas the French authorities require each year written confirmation that I am still alive and this must be witnessed by the local Garda station to whom I show my passport.
Perhaps your correspondent could clarify who "automatically notifies" the social welfare authorities of all deaths in Ireland and what checks are in place to ensure that they have been notified? - yours, etc,
DAVID McCABE,
Waltham Terrace,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.