‘Benefit trap’ for people with disabilities

A ‘benefit trap’ can be a disincentive to some people with disabilities taking up employment, Shannon town councillors were told this week, as some people may be actually better off not working.

Tomás de Buitleir of the Clare Supported Employment Service addressed the town councillors and spoke about some of the issues keeping their clients out of the workforce.
He said even before the downturn, it was difficult to place clients but now employers are looking for workers to do several tasks, some of which may be beyond the scope of people on the service’s books. “Supermarkets might have taken on someone who would be able to stack shelves or to do security but now they want people to do three or four tasks.”
The benefit trap can also impact, he added. “A lot of our clients are only able to work part-time and financially it doesn’t pay them to take up a job.”
He said that someone getting €180 on welfare would have to work around 20 hours on the minimum wage “before they are standing still”.
Mr de Buitleir said people are also afraid to come off benefits in case they can’t get them back in the future.
He also outlined the terms of the Wage Subsidy Scheme, which allows €5.30 an hour to be paid to employees who take on a worker who has a productivity shortfall.
He said that the job in question must be sustainable and must be for 21 hours a week or more. “One side-effect is that the employee loses any benefit they are on,” he added.
A number of the members criticised the particular difficulties faced by people with disabilities in taking up employment. “The bottom line is that it’d be very hard to recommend anyone for a scheme like this,” said Mayor of Shannon, Mary Brennan.
“If a person with a disability wants independence, they will lose rent allowance and not very many can work 35 hours a week,” she added.
Councillor Greg Duff said that while money is ­important to everyone, the importance of work for a person’s ­“respect as a human being” should also be borne in mind.
He said the key word is equality and he blamed successive governments for ­allowing an anomaly to develop. Councillor Patricia McCarthy suggested the council “make representations to the minister to close the loop hole”.
Councillor Gerry Flynn praised the Clare Supported Employment Service, “The work you do is invaluable,” he commented.