Business minister Heather Humphreys has introduced changes to Employment Permit Regulations applying to the agri-food sector which will make it easier to obtain work permits in order to hire non-EU workers. 

The minister (pictured) has instructed her department to make available 500 extra work permits for the horticulture sector, 250 for the meat industry and 50 for the dairy sector.

Humphreys said the measures are aimed at alleviating the immediate difficulties that companies in the sector are experiencing.  Permit conditions include a new minimum remuneration threshold of €22,000 p.a. for the occupations covered by the new rules, and specific obligations on employers covering the welfare and prospects of the foreign nationals employed, which include ensuring they have access to suitable accommodation and to training such as language skills.

The need to source workers from outside the EU for the roles concerned is despite the fact that taxpayers will fund €1,840m payments this year to recipients of Jobseekers Allowance, the welfare benefit for long-term unemployed people. The number of JA claimants in March 2018 was 165,400, of whom 95,000 have been claiming JA for more than a year.

This JA total counted by the Live Register doesn’t include the 60,000 people who are engaged in various activation programmes, all of whom are in receipt of weekly payments funded by the Exchequer. Adding the activation total to the Live Register total gives a figure of 292,000 people in receipt of weekly income supports through March.

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Among those excluded from the JA count on the Live Register are the 21,700 people participating on Community Employment schemes. These are budgeted to cost taxpayers €500m in 2018.