Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independents 4 Change) | Oireachtas source

A worker, who has been working on the front line and at the coalface of the Covid-19 pandemic since last March, thereby risking her health and well-being, has contacted me. She told me that she and her colleagues had been put on the temporary wage subsidy scheme, TWSS, without consultation. We know that under that scheme, an employer experiencing a minimum of 25% decline in turnover can apply for a worker to be kept on the books on the net pay that they were on before. The employer can also claim up to 70% of that waged salary. Like all other workers in the McCauley's pharmacy group, this worker was contacted by the Revenue in January to notify her that she had a tax obligation on that net pay. She has been told that she owes €2,000 in tax to Revenue, which amounts to three weeks' pay for that worker. No worker should be forced to pay this tax liability. It should be paid by the employer within the scheme. I ask the Taoiseach to let employers know that they are obliged to pay this tax for their workers, and it is not for the workers to pay.

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