Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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34. To ask the Minister for Trade, Enterprise and Employment the plans being made regarding the redundancy moratorium; and if his Department has engaged with workers and the trade union movement regarding the matter. [37249/20]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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In March 2020 the Government introduced an emergency amendment to the Redundancy Payments Act 1967 which effectively suspends an employee’s entitlement to claim redundancy from their employer following certain periods of lay-off or short-time work due to Covid-19 during the emergency period.  The Government was concerned that the financial impact of significant redundancy claims at this time would have a serious impact on the potential for businesses, and the economy as a whole, to recover which in turn could result in significant insolvency situations, with further permanent job losses.  

There has been ongoing dialogue with both employee and employer representative groups on the continued operation of the emergency provision, Section 12A of the Redundancy Payments Act 1967. Most recently, at the meeting of the LEEF Sub-Group on Employment Legislation/Regulation which I chaired on 30th September, I sought the views of LEEF members.  Submissions from ICTU, IBEC, Chambers Ireland and the Construction Industry Federation (CIF) were received. 

The matter of a further extension is currently under consideration.   In its deliberations, the Government will have regard to the social partners’ views, the criteria and principles underpinning the emergency provision and the public health and labour market situations.  

All other redundancy provisions remain unchanged and in force.  If an employer is going to make an employee redundant, protections such as notice periods for redundancy and the payment of a redundancy lump-sum to the affected employee still apply.