Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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343. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she will provide additional placements for Tús for counties Cavan and Monaghan; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [36585/13]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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355. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she will provide additional placements for the rural social scheme for Counties Cavan and Monaghan; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [36669/13]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 343 and 355 together.

The Government, as part of the Budget package for 2013 announced a number of initiatives focused on providing work opportunities for those currently unemployed. A key element of this package was to add an additional 2,500 places to Tús – the community work placement initiative.

The current position is that the extra 2,500 Tús placements have been committed nationally with an extra allocation of 60 placements for Cavan and 40 placements for Monaghan. There are currently no resources available to allocate any extra places and any additional allocation of places to Cavan or Monaghan would result in a reduction of places to another county. Your request for additional places has been noted and will be considered if more placements become available.

The purpose of the rural social scheme (RSS) is to provide income support for farmers and fisherpersons who have an entitlement to specified social welfare payments. The scheme currently provides work opportunities for around 2,600 participants and 130 supervisory staff. The scheme currently provides work opportunities for 2,600 participants and 130 supervisory staff of which 120 participants and 6 supervisors are engaged in Counties Cavan and Monaghan.

All places nationally are currently allocated with funding for 2013 amounting to €45m. This does not allow for the recruitment of additional participants above the numbers stated above. I have no plans to increase the number of places available on this scheme.