Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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166. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the total value of the rates waiver provided to businesses in counties Cavan and Monaghan to the end of October 2020. [37549/20]

Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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In recognising the difficulties faced by businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Programme for Government – “Our Shared Future” committed to set out how commercial rates will be treated for the remainder of 2020.  One of the earliest priorities of Minister O'Brien and I was to secure funding to provide a waiver of commercial rates for businesses impacted by the pandemic, while simultaneously supporting local authorities.

€600m was allocated by Government to fund the cost of a six-month waiver of rates from 27 March to 27 September 2020, which took the form of a credit in lieu of rates.  To strengthen this support, the Government subsequently announced a three month extension of the waiver until 27 December 2020, at an additional cost of €300m.  The criteria for the extended waiver remains the same and it is intended that the extended waiver will be automatically applied to rate accounts that benefitted from the six-month waiver.  This brings to €900m the financial support to fund the cost of a waiver of commercial rates, which is an unprecedented measure that offers support to businesses and certainty to local authorities.

Payments in relation to the six month waiver are being made in three stages, two of which are complete.  An initial allocation was paid to local authorities on 21 October 2020.  Following completion of the administration of the six month waiver to eligible businesses, the second payment to local authorities was made on 13 November.  At the end of stage two, almost 118,000 ratepayers had benefited from the six month rates waiver and just under €460m of rates had been waived by local authorities and funded by Government.  The final allocation for the six month waiver will be paid to local authorities in December, on completion of the rates waiver to businesses in excluded categories that demonstrated serious impact from COVID 19 to their relevant local authority.  The funding for the three month extension of the rates waiver will be paid to local authorities in a single payment in December.

On 13 November, on completion of two of three payments for the six month rates waiver, Cavan County Council had waived €3,660,529 of rates for a period of six months for 1,670 ratepayers and Monaghan County Council had waived €3,671,742 of rates for a six month period for 1,761 rate payers.  On completion of the last stage of the six month waiver and the three month waiver extension in December, the value of rates waivers provided will further increase.  Full details of payments to date are available at the following link: