It is the employer’s responsibility to pay statutory redundancy and other wage related entitlements to all eligible employees. An eligible employee is entitled to two weeks statutory redundancy payment for every year of service, plus a bonus week. Compensation is based on the worker’s length of reckonable service and reckonable weekly remuneration, subject to a ceiling of €600 per week. In the event that an employer is unable to pay these entitlements due to financial difficulties, the Department can step in to make a payment from the Social Insurance Fund, as part of the redundancy and insolvency payments schemes. The ceiling limit has been reviewed and changed on a number of occasions and the limit was last increased in January 2005 from €507.90 to €600 per week following agreement between the social partners in the ‘Sustaining Progress’ talks during 2004.
An increase in the ceiling limit would result in an additional cost to employers and also to the Social Insurance Fund. Any consideration of an adjustment to the limit involves consultation with a number of Government Departments, the social partners and other relevant stakeholders and is subject to the approval of the Minister for Finance.
I have no plans to increase the ceiling limit at this time.