Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 27 May 2020
71. Deputy Ged Nash asked the Minister for Finance the status of arrears owed to employers under the TWSS relating to employees that were rehired since 1 May 2020; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [7725/20]
Amharc ar fhreagra76. Deputy Michael McGrath asked the Minister for Finance if an employer that laid off a worker onto the pandemic unemployment payment can rehire that employee under the temporary wage subsidy scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [7891/20]
Amharc ar fhreagraI propose to take Questions Nos. 71 and 76 together.
The Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme (TWSS) was is provided for in section 28 of the recently enacted Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Covid-19) Act 2020.
The TWSS is an emergency measure to deal with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the economy. Of necessity, the underlying legislation and the scheme itself were developed quickly, having regard to the Government objective of providing assistance to employers and employees, where businesses have been seriously affected by the pandemic and the necessary restrictions introduced as a result of this Public Health emergency.
It must be accepted that the TWSS cannot be adapted to meet the particular circumstances of individual employers or employees. The objective of the scheme is to ensure the key relationship between employers and employees is maintained to the greatest extent possible so that businesses can restart operations once the crisis has passed.
In the context of the need for immediate implementation of the TWSS, the scheme necessarily had to build on data returned to Revenue through its real-time PAYE system. The key conditions of the scheme, as prescribed in the underlying law, are that –
- the business is suffering significant negative economic impact due to the pandemic,
- the employees were on the payroll at 29 February 2020, and
- the employer had fulfilled its PAYE reporting obligations for February 2020 before, in general, 15 March 2020, although this deadline was extended recently to 1 April 2020.
The latter two conditions were particularly designed with a view to preventing abuse of the scheme.
Accordingly, it follows that the TWSS can only operate in respect of an employee, whether full-time or part-time, who was on the payroll of the employer as at 29 February 2020. Eligible employers can participate in the scheme in respect of any eligible employees on their payroll, including rehired staff who were temporarily laid off. Where an eligible employee previously laid off has been re-hired, the employee will qualify for the scheme once their claim for social welfare benefit (Pandemic Unemployment Benefit /Jobseekers Benefit) is ceased.
While the TWSS is payable to eligible staff that were rehired after 1 May 2020, I have been advised by Revenue that further IT development work was required to facilitate the processing of such cases. Revenue has completed this system development and the required technology is now in place. Revenue has confirmed that in excess of 30,000 employees have started or restarted employments since 1 May 2020, of which approximately 10,000 are ‘rehired’ staff that are eligible for the TWSS. Employers who submitted payroll after 1 May for those ‘rehired’ staff were processed for refund and the refund will be in employers’ bank accounts early this week. The system will pick-up and process additional re-hires on a daily basis that appear on payroll submissions.
