Mr. John Callinan:

Senator Healy Eames also reacted to the point about the high proportion of jobless households. We are starting to examine and have a better understanding of the issue. While the figure is stark, what gets less attention is that at the height of the boom - going back to 2006 and 2007 - the corresponding figure was 15%. In many ways, this is a more stark comment on a time when we talked of having close to full employment. It is a complex issue and a complex area and we need a better understanding of embedded joblessness and what it means. It is being looked at in some detail.

Deputy Durkan asked how we are ensuring that right across the system everything is being done and that we are learning the lessons of the past rather than waiting until the end and looking back, and how we are engaging in this regard with our EU partners. I would like to believe that the answer to the first part of the Deputy's question is "Yes". This initiative is being run on a cross-governmental basis across all Departments and agencies, be it through the Action Plan for Jobs process or the broader national reform programme. The message has gone out that tackling unemployment, creating jobs and the environment for their creation is the priority of everybody across all arms of government.

On the European issue, the answer is the precise reason we are here today, namely, the national reform programme and all of the processes built around it, including the European semester which brings together the 27 member states and the EU, in a collective sense, to monitor the performance, individually, of member states and to cross-monitor all 27 countries. There is no one-size-fits-all process. Each member state is different and their economic circumstances are different. It is question of ensuring that each country is doing what is most appropriate to its particular circumstances and conditions and, as stated by the Deputy, ensuring that nobody is stepping out of kilter with that broad effort. The Compact for Growth and Jobs agreed by the Heads of State and Government in June 2012 also provides an EU-wide blueprint for ensuring every country is doing what it should be doing in this area. The committee should be in no doubt that the job creation agenda is a cross-government initiative, which we are continually monitoring and reviewing.

On the Chairman's question in regard to the country-specific recommendations, the short answer is, "I do not know". We could probably spend a great deal of time speculating on that issue. It is in some way part of a bigger set of issues for us, including what does "beyond the bailout" mean and what does it look like. In simple terms, it means that in this particular process we will, in effect, at that point next year be producing a new national reform programme. The new programme will not be dramatically different but we will have a little more scope and be expected to produce a full document. The country-specific recommendations will to some extent derive from whatever the post-bailout phase looks and feels like because the problems with which we are currently grappling will not have gone away. Whether we are under an EU-IMF programme or operating under own steam in close consultation with our colleagues and partners, the trajectory will be similar.