Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The local authorities are aware of the individuals who are going through the appeal process. To be very clear, this is not for new entrants. These are people who already were in the system. I would genuinely say the mechanism was designed to make it easy for businesses to draw down. Over the calendar year 2024, we got close to €0.5 billion out to businesses up and down the country, which was extraordinary. Some local authorities were frankly better than others in administering it and working with businesses on the ground but I think it was a very strong success. Like any scheme, there will always be challenges where someone makes a claim that they were not aware of it or did not get the correct advice when they went through the mechanism to apply. We want to respond as best we can to the many representations we have received from the sectors in respect of those cohorts. We will be doing that in the next couple of weeks.