John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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65. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the cumulative additional expenditure undertaken due to the Covid pandemic since February 2020; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11485/22]

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Supporting society and the economy has been a Government priority since the onset of the pandemic. Supports were introduced swiftly in 2020, with a range of schemes introduced to support incomes, employment and key public services. Over €16½ billion in funding was made available for measures to mitigate the impacts of the pandemic during 2020, which provided for essential economic and societal supports. This provided additional funding to support our health service in responding to the impact of the pandemic; to support the operation of public transport; and support the reopening of the Education sector. These measures included income and employment support schemes such as the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme (TWSS), Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) and Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP), along with a range of other business supports such as liquidity supports, restart grants and the commercial rates waivers.

During 2021, as Covid-19 continued to impact, key schemes and supports were extended.  In addition to the measures provided for by allocations made to Departments in the Revised Estimates for Covid-19 related measures, the funding held in reserve under Budget 2021 was allocated during the year to provide for measures such as the further extension of the PUP and EWSS schemes, additional supports for businesses and particularly impacted sectors such as live entertainment. Across the year, provision of almost €13½ billion was made for Covid-19 related measures.

For 2022, €3.1 billion in funding to address the impacts of Covid-19 has already been allocated at Departmental level in the 2022 Revised Estimates, including €0.2 billion for projects funded under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. A further €3.9 billion remains held in reserve, to be allocated if required during the year for targeted measures to address the continued challenges caused by the pandemic. Within this, specific amounts have been earmarked for the Education and Health sectors and for labour market impacts. The contingency funding will be used to support our economy and society over the coming year and will be allocated to specific expenditure measures that can be most effective at that particular time.

Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail)
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67. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the contingency allocation he has set aside for Covid-related matters in 2022; the amount that has been drawn down to date in 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11370/22]

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The Budget 2022 expenditure ceilings reflect funding of €6.8 billion for our public services to address the challenges of Covid-19 with a further €0.2 billion of investments under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. Just over €4 billion of this amount was held in reserve.

In REV 2022, just under €0.1 of the contingency was allocated with €51 million to Education for term 2 Covid-19 measures, €25 million for Live Entertainment, €10 million for a support scheme for travel agents, and €10 million for a Covid mitigation redundancy and insolvency scheme.

Key measures have been extended as necessary since the beginning of the pandemic in order to continue essential support, most recently in response to the impact of the Omicron wave where a number of further measures were agreed by Government including for the EWSS and PUP and in respect of a further Commercial Rates Waiver for particularly impacted sectors.

Budget 2022, set out the planned phasing out of the EWSS. Reflecting the impact of the public health response to Omicron, Government agreed to extend the enhanced rate of subsidy for a further two months across December 2021 and January 2022 and also to the reopening of the scheme for certain businesses.

In January, Government agreed that businesses availing of EWSS that were directly impacted by the Public Health Regulations introduced in December, would continue to receive the enhanced rates of subsidy for the month of February, with the graduated step-down in subsidy rates being delayed by one month. Such firms would continue to receive support under the scheme until 31 May 2022.

Any additional costs arising from these measures, along with costs due to increased demand on testing and on the Covid Illness Benefit Scheme, would fall to be met from the contingency reserve. This will leave funds available in the reserve to be allocated, if required, for targeted measures depending on the situation with the virus later in the year.