PUP To Be Phased Out, Entirely, From February 2022.

Tuesday, 1 June 2021 09:23

Rates will be cut by €50 a week for each group.

The Pandemic Unemployment Payment is to be entirely removed by February 2022.

The wage support will be phased out in three stages starting in September under plans going to Cabinet.

Our Political Correspondent Seán Defoe reports:

"The government promised no cliff edge end to these payments and instead it is more of a gentle slope.

Last night the government party leaders agreed to end the Pandemic Unemployment Payment by February next year after a series of reductions in the value of the payment.

Plans going to cabinet will see the rates of PUP cut in the middle of September, and again in mid-November, before it's entirely phased out by February.

Rates will be cut by €50 a week for each group on PUP.

So someone on the €350 rate will drop to €300 in September; then drop to €250 in November; and finally to €203 in February.

Others will reach that bottom rate a bit sooner.

The Pandemic Unemployment Payment will close to new applicants on July 1st and students will no longer be eligible from September when the new academic year begins.

125,000 people have come off PUP since the economy began to open up and the government expects this number to increase.

The broader National Economic Plan to be published by cabinet today will set out targets for creating jobs over the next 18 months as plans for the recovery get put in place."

Plan to reboost the Irish economy and phase-out the PUP to be decided by Cabinet today https://t.co/TzgyUE9luO
— TheJournal.ie (@thejournal_ie) June 1, 2021

Social Democrats TD, Gary Gannon, says he has concerns about the planned cut:

Opposition TDs say people who can't work shouldn't have their PUP payments stopped, but Minister Michael McGrath says it will be a gradual phasing out: