Over 4,000 Kildare people still on Covid-19 payment

Over 1,700 young people under the age of 25 in Co Kildare are receiving the Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP), according to figures from the National Youth Council of Ireland (NYCI) 

A total of 4,123 are availing of the weekly payment which rises to a maximum amount of €350.

The 1,7626 people under 25 represent 23% of the total number of recipients. 

The Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment is available to employees and the self-employed who have lost their job on or after 13 March due to the pandemic.

The Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment will be in place until August 10.

The National Youth Council of Ireland (NYCI) - which represents organisations working with over 380,000 young people nationwide – has called on the Government to bring forward a package of measures to support young jobseekers with a €191m investment to address the high levels of youth unemployment in the July Jobs Initiative to be announced next week.

“With 1,025 young people under 25 in county Carlow in receipt of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) and at a time when we have 45.4% youth unemployment and over 140,000 young people out of work, it is vital that the July Jobs Initiative focuses heavily on the needs of young jobseekers,” commented James Doorley, NYCI Deputy Director. 

 “NYCI is calling for investment in programmes such as the Back to Education Allowance, SOLAS training programmes, the Youth Employment Support Scheme, a national Access to Apprenticeship Programme and Jobsplus Youth that will support up to 28,000 young people.

 “Further investment and actions will be required later this year, in light of the scale of the challenge, but we need to make a start now and give young people some hope and support,” explained Mr Doorley.  

 The latest numbers available show 89,544 young people under 25 are currently in receipt of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP), which is 22% of all of those receiving the payment.

“It is also important to note that before the pandemic hit, despite job growth in the Irish economy and the welcome decline since the last crisis, youth unemployment in December 2019 stood at 12.6%.****

This was three times the overall unemployment rate. 

 “In addition to the young people on the pandemic unemployment payment, there are 29,579***** young people under 25 on the Live Register and 20,413 young people under 25 on the Disability Allowance,” added Mr Doorley.     

“The number of young people on the PUP since the peak in early May has declined by over 32,000. This is very welcome, and we hope it continues to decline further. However, the reality is that even if half the current number on the payment exit, that would still leave 45,000 young people out of work.

“As a society and an economy, we cannot afford to make the mistakes of the past, where young people were left to linger on the dole queues for years on end and the Governmental response was slow and inadequate.

“That is why NYCI is calling for actions and investment now and €191m investment. We acknowledge that this may appear a large sum, but the cost of leaving 28,000 young people on the dole for a year would be €164m, so the net cost of the measures we are proposing would be just €27m. This of course does not take into account the social and financial benefit of the proposed measures for young people, their families, communities and Irish society as a whole. Just last week our neighbours in the UK, announced a €2bn fund to tackle youth unemployment,” continued Mr Doorley.