Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Fuel Allowance is a payment of €33 per week for 28 weeks (a total of €924 each year) from late September to April, at an estimated cost of €412 million in 2023. The purpose of this payment is to assist these households with their energy costs. Only one allowance is paid per household.

The Job Initiative Scheme provided full-time employment for people 35 years of age or over who had been unemployed for five years or more. Since November 2004, there has been no recruitment to the Scheme. Since January 2004, participants on the Job Initiative Scheme cannot retain their entitlement to Fuel Allowance while participating on the scheme. This decision was taken because, at the time, the minimum rate of payment to participants on the scheme was significantly higher than the rate of qualifying Social Welfare payments.

The minimum rate of payment to a Job Initiative participant is still significantly higher than most Social Welfare primary payments, including payments such as Illness Benefit and Jobseeker's Benefit, which are also non-qualifying payments for Fuel Allowance.

Any decision to provide participants on the Job Initiative Scheme with access to the Fuel Allowance payment would have to be considered in the context of budgetary negotiations. However, any such decision would change the targeted nature of the Fuel Allowance scheme, as it would be awarding the payment to people in full-time employment who are not in receipt of a qualifying Social Protection payment.

Finally, the Department of Social Protection provides Additional Needs Payments as part of the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme for people who have an essential need which they cannot meet from their own resources. These payments are available through our Community Welfare Officers.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.