Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Mr. Cosgrave and thank him for his remarks. People like him are an inspiration to the new generation, particularly at this difficult time.

Mr. Cosgrave sold himself short when he said that he can only identify where to create a relatively small number of jobs but thousands of jobs is a different issue. It is not. It is simply extending the same format, identifying the marketplace, discovering where vacancies exist and identifying the educational qualifications required.

We are short on statistics here. I am a great believer in examining statistics and figuring out a response. People have expressed their despair at the high levels of unemployment which was a natural corollary to the downturn in the European economies. There was no other way around it and it had to happen. An upturn will be equally dramatic. It is critical that we identify where and when an upturn will take place and how best to capitalise on it.

Let us examine the European statistics on youth unemployment which state that the chances for a young unemployed person of finding a job are low - only 29.7% of those aged between 15 and 24 years who were unemployed in 2010 found a job in 2011. That was too soon to expect an improvement. It was not possible to benefit from economic recovery in such a short period. It is not a magic formula. We must find the depth, establish the foundation and start building again. That applies to Ireland and right across Europe. When young people do find work their jobs tend to be less stable. In 2012, 42% of young employees worked on temporary contracts; this is four times greater than the equivalent figure for older employees. That is true. I do not want to make a political statement but some of the training schemes introduced by the Government led to surprising results. Quite a number of the participants found permanent jobs. The participants benefited from a bit of experience, thus creating confidence in their ability to find their feet in the marketplace. More of that is required.

Another interesting statistic is that early school leavers are a high-risk group with 54.2% not being employed while within this group about 70% want to work. Therefore, 30% of them do not want to work and must be motivated. That is the point that Senator Colm Burke raised. We must deal with a sizeable number of the young population on this basis.

It is important that we inspire the younger generation and generate interest in different areas of work. If they lack inspiration, there is a serious void in what we are doing and we need to address the issue forensically in a more scientific way than we have done heretofore.

I think employment comes down to a combination of education and training. The two must be combined. We need to identify where job vacancies are likely to occur. We can identify the areas in which jobs were lost in the past five years. We see recovery in the manufacturing and services sectors, the IT and pharmaceutical sectors and in the export-generated sectors. There will also be recovery in the construction sector in the not too distant future. In spite of what people say, our population has not gone away. The population has risen, which is totally the opposite of what happened in the 1950s, 1960s and 1980s. We must prepare to capitalise on the rise in population and our people must have the necessary skills to be able to access the employment generated.

Deputy Timmy Dooley is correct in his assessment of the Government's role in job creation. There are two ways to get involved. One must create the economic environment. However, let me sound a word of warning. We were in similar economic situations in the 1970s and 1980s. Unfortunately, the economists took several different directions. I do not want to cast aspersions on economists, but when the economy has stalled and the current budget cannot be balanced, we are not in a position to spend more money as we would be increasing our indebtedness. We tried this in the 1970s and the 1980s and it did not work. We have an open economy and we must be very careful how we proceed. The Government should invest in education and skills improvement as a preliminary measure.