Dáil debates

Thursday, 28 May 2020

Estimates for Public Services 2020 (Resumed)

 

6:05 pm

Photo of Regina DohertyRegina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy heard earlier from the Minister for Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform, he will bring a memorandum to Cabinet tomorrow and that wage subsidy anomaly will be resolved.

As regards maternity benefit, I do not know how many women are involved, but a number of women whose maternity benefit had finished came to us and we in the Department sanctioned them for the Covid payment because they could follow up the declaration that their income had fallen away because of Covid as they were not able to go back to work. If there is any money owed to them, that balance and rebalance will have to be done. Nobody is going to be left without money that is owed to them. Once I have the numbers, I will come back to the Deputy.

I do not mean to repeat myself, but with regard to the other two questions he asked, the Revised Estimate before us has been done on the basis of no change in policy. When we did the Estimates at the end of last year, we were not looking at many of the columns we are looking at today. Last year, the number of applicants for the back to work enterprise allowance dropped from 5,620 applicants to 3,406, which is more than 2,000 fewer people year on year. A few months ago, the economy was booming and we could not find people to work in the jobs being created. We had an entirely different situation than we have today. I envisage that the back to work enterprise allowance and the short-term working scheme will feature very heavily, and if I am here in the next few weeks when it is instigated, they will change and I will come back to the Dáil to make those suggestions and get advice. However, we will need an entirely new plethora of activation supports, including re-education and retraining supports, for all those who may not be able to go back to work in the same shape, form or even in the same company they would have on 13 March.

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