Mr. John McKeon:

The plan has yet to be finalised. It is one of the issues in respect of which we have acquired OECD involvement. None of the other European countries has yet submitted its plans. I presume all countries will submit their applications on the last day of December. We will all be watching one another. We are awaiting what the OECD has to say before finalising the plan. If one does the rough arithmetic, it is not positive. There are approximately 5 million unemployed young people in Europe and approximately 60,000 young unemployed people in Ireland. If one divides the €6 billion by 5 million and multiplies by 53,000 one gets Ireland's likely pro rata share. We have an expectation of approximately €60 million, but are optimistic we can do better than that. As mentioned earlier by Mr. Corcoran, this would equate to approximately €100 million within the State.

On training for facilitators and career guidance people and whether we have sufficient staff, there are 300 people in the Department who are trained employment advisers, most of whom have been educated through a diploma level course in NUI Maynooth in adult guidance. However, 300 staff is nowhere near sufficient. The Department also funds approximately 170 staff in the local employment services. This means we have 470 dedicated staff in this area. However, we probably need close to 2,000 people. These are the published OECD and European Union figures. We are currently redeploying an additional 300 staff within the Department.

We are training them currently and we plan to redeploy a further 200 next year, meaning that we will add 500 to the mix between this and next year. In parallel we are considering contracting options and the possibility of using outside resources to complement ours and those of the local employment services. That is an option, as it is quite urgent that we get extra resources in place. The Government has approved consideration of that contracting option and the staff are being trained.

I have mentioned before that guidance within the Department is a continuum, from personal guidance of people with real barriers to direction on whether people are applying for a type of job that suits them. By and large, the Department is at the directive guidance end of matters. We look to local employment services, including guidance counsellors in education and training boards, for guidance at a more personal level. It is not that fine a cut and the issue is not black and white. By and large, that is the approach we will take.