12,000 Kildare workers still receiving support related to Covid-19 pandemic

More than 12,000 Kildare workers are still receiving some form of Government support due to the Covid-19 pandemic, figures have shown.

In Kildare, there are 950 employers and 12,055 employees on the Employment Wage Subidy Scheme (EWSS).

In addition, there are 705 businesses on the Covid Restrictions Support Scheme (CRSS) and 55 on the Business Resumption Support Scheme (BRSS).

Introduced in Budget 2021, the CRSS allows qualifying businesses affected by restrictions to apply to Revenue for a cash payment of up to €5,000 a week.

The figures were provided by Minister for Finance, Paschal Donohoe who said he expected to phase out some supports in 2022 as the pandemic stabilises.

He said: “I believe our health service will allow us to reach a point in the new year where we will need to phase out the EWSS.

“It is a scheme that has played an invaluable role in our economy, but it was primarily designed to deal with the threat of mass unemployment in our country.

“It has prevented the threat of mass unemployment, but we cannot find ourselves in a position as we move through 2022 that we have a labour market shortage and a high demand for workers while running the unemployment wage subsidy scheme at the same time.

“We are not at that point yet and that is why we have extended the scheme.”