Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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236. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if a person (details supplied) can work part-time and receive a social welfare payment part-time without having their employment level prevent them from qualifying for a social welfare payment; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [35235/22]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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Jobseeker’s Allowance (JA) is a means-tested payment made to people who are unemployed and who do not qualify for Jobseeker’s Benefit.

Among the other qualifying conditions for JA, a person must be fully or partly unemployed for at least 4 days in any consecutive 7 days.  In addition, the person’s household income must be below a certain level to qualify.  Their income from work is assessed and can affect their JA payment.  However, only a certain amount of income from work is taken into account.

If a person is getting JA, they can use a Benefit of Work Estimator, available on www.gov.ie to see how taking up part-time work would affect the amount of JA they would get.  The Estimator works out the total amount a person would get if they take up part-time work (including any Working Family Payment payable for their family) and compares this to what they are getting in Jobseeker's payments (including Rent Supplement).

According to the records of my Department, the person concerned was awarded JA on 20/12/2021 at the full personal rate.  The person subsequently commenced casual work during the period 06/05/2022 to 06/06/2022 and was in receipt of JA with daily means of €47 assessed for each day worked.  The person concerned returned to a full personal rate when she became fully unemployed from 07/06/2022.

I trust this clarifies the matter.