Maintaining Covid supports for businesses is 'not sustainable', warns Michael McGrath

Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Michael McGrath said yesterday there will be no "cliff-edge" to the payments but "maintaining the level of support at the current rate of expenditure is not sustainable." Picture: Damien Storan.

The tapering off of Covid-related supports for businesses and workers beyond June will be laid out by the Government by the end of May.

Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Michael McGrath said there will be no "cliff-edge" to the payments but "maintaining the level of support at the current rate of expenditure is not sustainable."

"By the end of May, we will set out what our plans are, the government has not made any decision in relation to specific rates beyond the end of June at this point," Mr McGrath said.

"We have made it consistently clear that the supports would not come to an abrupt end because we acknowledged that that would have a very serious negative impact.

"There are people for whom their job will not be available to them again for a couple of months and equally changes to the wage subsidy scheme need to be very carefully calibrated... we don't want to make changes that result in people going from the wage subsidy scheme to the pandemic unemployment payment (PUP).

"Over the course of this month Government will give very careful consideration to the supports that are currently being provided, and we've committed that there will be no change up to the end of June.

"We acknowledge the hugely valuable nature of the supports, and so we need to carefully balance a range of considerations over the next number of weeks as we make those decisions.

"These are emergency type expenditures, but the unwinding of them will need to be done in a very careful and a gradual way over time."

Tens of thousands of people are expected to return to work in the coming months as society begins to reopen and government say they want to support businesses until "they can stand on their two feet".

The government has spent close to €4 billion on the PUP and wage subsidy scheme over the course of the pandemic.

"The decision will be confirmed in the next three to four weeks," Mr McGrath added.

"We are providing an extraordinary level of support between last year and this year, we are providing additional Covid-related expenditure of the order of €28 billion in the four months to the end of April alone.

"Beyond the end of June, we will take account of the timetable, which is now in place for the next couple of months at least in relation to reopening but it is certainly the case for some people, their job may not return by the end of June, and the Government will take that into account in the weeks ahead."