Cost of redundancy rebates falls to €49.5m

The decision by the Government to no longer pay a rebate to employers for statutory redundancy payments has seen the cost of the refunds fall from €373m three years ago to just €49.5m last year.

Figures released by Joan Burton, the social protection minister, show the State paid out almost €470m from the Social Insurance Fund.

That was made up of some €373m in rebates to employers as well as almost €97m in lump sum statutory redundancy payments to employees.