Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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499. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if forthcoming legislation on ending the compulsory retirement age will extend to those taking part in community employment schemes. [13093/17]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Community Employment (CE) is a non-statutory scheme put in place to support persons who are long-term unemployed and other vulnerable groups to gain the confidence and skills to re-enter the labour market. Schemes are sponsored by local community and voluntary groups who provide valuable support services to local communities. These sponsoring organisations employ supervisory staff to administer the scheme.

Funding is provided by the Department to the sponsoring organisations for the employment of staff up to state pension age. Once the staff member reaches state pension age (currently 66 years of age), that person can no longer be funded under CE. This is a long-established procedure and As CE placement can run to state pension age I have no plans to change these arrangements.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.