650,000 child benefit bonus payments of €100 to be made this month

More than 650,000 parents will receive a €100 child benefit bonus this month as part of the Government’s cost-of-living measures.

Social Protection Minister Heather Humphreys signed off on the payments which were agreed by the Coalition earlier this year.

The welfare payment was among a number of measures announced in February as part of a €1.3bn package of measures aimed at addressing record levels of inflation.

The move means parents of the 1.2 million children who qualify for the scheme will receive €240 per child this week.

In Dublin, 172,283 families will receive the bonus, 72,264 in Cork, 33,810 in Kildare, 33,772 in Galway, 30,645 in Meath.

The county with the lowest number of child benefit recipients is Leitrim, with 4,418 families receiving the payment. They are followed by Longford, with 5,976, Roscommon, 8,161, Monaghan, 8,332, and Sligo, 8,348.

Ms Humphreys said child benefit is an “extremely important income support that reaches hundreds of thousands of hard-working families”. “I’m deeply conscious of the difficulties families are facing right now in meeting their bills,” she added.

The minister said the extra child benefit payment will be received in people’s bank accounts from tomorrow.

Child benefit is a monthly payment of €140 for each child and it is paid to families with children up to the age of 16. The payment continues to be paid for children until their 18th birthday if they are in full-time education or have a disability.

A double payment of child benefit was paid to eligible families after the Budget last September.

In April, 1.3 million pensioners, carers, people with disabilities and working families received a €200 bonus on top of their regular welfare payments.

Meanwhile, parents who receive the Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance will also receive an additional €100 for each child this summer.

While parents are set to receive a cash bonus, motorists were last week hit with an increase in excise duty on petrol and diesel.

Petrol increased by 6c a litre and by 5c a litre for diesel from June 1 and will increase again in September and October. Excise duty on motor fuel was reduced in March 2022 after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The Government has introduced a series of supports over the last 18 months aimed at easing the financial burden experienced by families.

They also extended the reduced rate of Vat on the hospitality and tourism sector until the end of August.

Any further measures, such as electricity credits, will be considered as part of the budgetary process, after the summer recess.

Fine Gael is hold a special parliamentary party meeting to discuss its Budget objectives next week.

Reducing childcare costs is a key aim of the Programme for Government, and Children’s Minister Roderic O’Gorman has already introduced a number of reforms in this area.

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