Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 18 Nov 1998

Vol. 496 No. 7

Written Answers. - Employment Support Services.

Frances Fitzgerald

Ceist:

135 Ms Fitzgerald asked the Minister for Finance the number of people on the job initiative scheme who have been successful in moving to the job assist back to work programme; if it is feasible to move from one initiative to the other; if benefits remain the same; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24147/98]

Minister for Finance (Mr. McCreevy)

The Revenue job assist is a new initiative introduced by me in the 1998 budget to assist the long-term unemployed back to work.

According to statistics produced by the Revenue Commissioners on the evening of the 16 November a total of 920 cases had been issued a tax free allowance which included the job assist allowance. Of these 375 were in receipt of additional allowances in respect of children. Statistics are not available, either from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment or from the Office of the Revenue Commissioners, of the number of these people who were previously engaged on a job initiative scheme.

The Revenue Commissioners have informed me that their computer files are not set up in a way which makes it possible to identify customers who were previously on a job initiative pro-gramme. I have been advised that to develop automatic facilities to produce this information would involve programming and testing of software which could only be carried out at a disproportionate cost.

It certainly is feasible to move from the job initiative scheme to the job assist scheme. The job assist allowance is available to an individual who takes up a qualifying employment, having been continuously unemployed for the immediate period of 52 weeks prior to taking up the job and who has been in receipt of: unemployment benefit or unemployment assistance or one parent family payment.

For the purposes of deciding whether an individual has the requisite 52 weeks of continuous unemployment, time spent on a number of Stateaided training courses or schemes will qualify as periods of unemployment, provided the individual had been in receipt of unemployment assistance, unemployment benefit or one parent family payment immediately prior to commencing the training. The training schemes or courses concerned include the job initiative programme administered by FÁS.

As regards the retention by employees of secondary benefits under both schemes, under the job assist programme an employee can retain his or her medical card for three years from the date he or she returns to work. Other secondary benefits such as rent-mortgage subsidy, fuel allowance, etc., can also be retained for three years provided the gross pay is less than £250 weekly. The employee is also entitled to benefit from the family income supplement, FIS, provided the family income falls below the qualifying limit.

I understand from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment that jobs initiative workers can qualify for family income supplement in the same way as other workers and retain child dependant allowances for 13 weeks upon commencement of employment, and for that reason jobs initiative workers are not entitled to secondary social welfare benefits.

Frances Fitzgerald

Ceist:

136 Ms Fitzgerald asked the Minister for Finance the number of jobs which have become available under the job assist back to work pro-gramme in the Dublin area; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24148/98]

Minister for Finance (Mr. McCreevy)

The Revenue job assist is a new initiative introduced by me in the 1998 budget to assist the long-term unemployed back to work.

According to statistics produced by the Revenue Commissioners on the 16 November 1998 a total of 920 cases had been issued a tax free allowance which included the job assist allowance. The breakdown was as follows: single cases 574; married cases 330; widowed cases 16.

Of the 920 cases who had been granted the allowance up to 16 November 1998, a total of 375 cases were also benefiting from the additional allowances in respect of qualifying children.

The statistics available are for the country as a whole and are not analysed on a regional basis. The facilities available to interrogate Revenue's database files, and in particular the PAYE computer files do not enable the production of the statistics required by the Deputy. I have been advised by the Revenue Commissioners that to develop the automatic facilities would involve programming and testing of software which could only be carried out at a disproportionate cost.

This having been said, during October a file was extracted of all customers in receipt of the allowance. At the date this file was extracted there were a total of 781 recipients.

Of these 781 customers, a total 385 were employed by employers registered in the general claims district 001, that is employers dealt with in Dublin city and the surrounding counties. This would suggest that roughly half of the recipients are from the Dublin catchment area, that is Dublin and the surrounding counties.