The €1,000 frontline worker recognition payment for Covid-19 is still being received by approximately 66,000 people.
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly stated more than 190,000 workers are eligible for the tax-free payment while speaking to the Oireachtas Health Committee. He acknowledged that approximately 124,000 people have so far received the payment.
As a token of appreciation for the work done by healthcare workers during the Covid-19 pandemic, the payment was first suggested late last year and formally announced in January.
Both full-time and part-time healthcare professionals who worked in settings where the virus was present for at least four weeks between March 1, 2020, and June 30, 2021, are qualified for the payment.
They include staff in private nursing homes, porters and cleaners in healthcare facilities, hospice workers, student nurses, employees at HSE test centres, and members of the Defense Forces who have been seconded to work in the medical field.
The payment is available to both full-time and part-time employees, though the amount due to the latter has to be calculated on a pro-rata basis.
Employees who left or changed jobs during the period are also eligible, but they must submit a declaration form by the end of June in order to receive payment.
While payments began earlier this year, questions continue to be asked about why some workers have received their payment and others have not.
Donnelly said he absolutely would have preferred people to have received their payments during the summer, but he told the committee that the “majority should be paid before Christmas”.
The minister added that he hopes those claims can be processed before Christmas. He noted that many of the claims from outside employers only reached the government in the last two weeks.