John Gerard Hanafin (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Bill, the purpose of which is to provide for the amendment and extension of the Redundancy Payments Act 1967, the amendment of the Redundancy Payments Act 1971, the Protection of Employees (Employers Insolvency) Acts 1984 to 2001, the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Act 1993, and the Employment Equality Act 1998, and to provide for related matters.

The Bill partly stems from the conclusions of the redundancy review group, which produced a number of areas of agreement. The group considered that increasing the upper age limit would not be a priority in the short term. It recommended that consideration should be given in the medium term to removing or raising the age cap in conjunction with similar changes to unfair dismissals, equality, social and family affairs legislation, as recommended in the recent report by the Equality Authority.

The group also agreed that insurability should continue to be a condition of eligibility for the redundancy scheme. The group endorsed the current criteria which are as follows: now or at any time in the past four years the person was in employment which is fully insurable for all class A benefits; now or at any time in the past four years the person was in employment which is not fully insurable for all benefits because his or her earnings are below the threshold for class cover, that is class J; and directors and other self-employed persons – class S – are excluded.