Neale Richmond (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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611. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if she will consider making the Christmas bonus and fuel allowance available for those who receive the working family payment; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [50443/21]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Christmas Bonus is paid to social welfare recipients such as pensioners, people with disabilities, carers, lone parents and the long-term unemployed in recognition of their long-term financial dependence on their social welfare payment for all or most of their income.  

The Working Family Payment (WFP) is an in-work support which provides an income top-up for employees, on low earnings, with children.  It is designed to prevent in-work poverty for low paid workers with child dependants and to offer a financial incentive to take up employment.  To qualify for WFP, a person must be engaged in full-time insurable employment which is expected to last for at least 3 months and be working for a minimum of 38 hours per fortnight or 19 hours per week. 

As WFP is a supplementary payment rather than a main source of income, recipients are not eligible for the Christmas Bonus or Fuel Allowance.

However, a person on another social welfare payment, while concurrently in receipt of WFP, will receive the Christmas Bonus or Fuel Allowance on their social welfare payment if they satisfy the criteria for receipt of the Bonus or Fuel Allowance on that scheme. 

Any change to the current eligibility criteria for the Christmas Bonus or Fuel Allowance payment would have to be considered in the overall policy and budgetary context.