Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The advisory group on tax and social welfare has done a great deal of work and published several reports on how to help families with children in particular and how to ensure that in every house there is a job for at least one of the adults. The committee will be aware that if children are living in a household where no one goes to work, sometimes the outcome for those children is far below what all of us would desire, even in terms of attendance at school and going on to third level education.

Let us consider the economies of Sweden and Finland. I highlight these two countries because they do not have large populations whereas Britain has. We might be better off looking at some of the Scandinavian and northern European countries, where they have strong social welfare systems and support systems but also strong back-to-work, back-to-education and back-to-training systems. Both Finland and Sweden had bank and economic collapses 20 years ago or more, and not only that; their nearest neighbour, the old Soviet Union, crashed. The economy in what was the old Soviet Union, which then became Russia, collapsed and was utterly chaotic for a period. I have followed closely what those countries did. During the recent Presidency of the Council of the European Union, when I chaired the Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council, I learned that those countries have a strong social consensus. They believe it is important to provide people who are in need of supported income with income support. This provides for social cohesion but in terms of the economy it helps money to circulate in a Keynesian way as well. It boosts the economy because people who are on a pension spend money in their local shops and so on. Those countries have a public employment service, as we now have, located in their social welfare departments.

The first time a person goes in to sign on and get a jobseeker's payment should be the first step in going back to work. That is absolutely critical. The idea is to change what the International Monetary Fund has described on several occasions as a somewhat passive social welfare structure in Ireland. The fund has said it is good but passive and that, basically, the emphasis is on paying benefits. I would prefer an active system where people get income support but we also help them actively to get back to work and into activation - that is the technical term. It is important that this should happen.

I maintain there are many differences between our system and the system in the United Kingdom. I would prefer the northern European model. I prefer to look at countries such as Austria, which has low rates of unemployment and a small population. It is a small country like ours. I prefer to look at Finland. It is interesting to observe what is happening in the United Kingdom but I am unsure whether much of what that country is doing is applicable socially to the Irish situation.

I have read reports of the programme to which Deputy Collins is referring, but it is essential that the social welfare system is in place to support people and that people are treated with dignity. When people become jobseekers under our system, they sign a contract with us, and have done since I became Minister, to the effect that they will do everything required to get themselves back to work and we must help them back to work. That is our social contract. The British may have a different approach but I would not be led by what they do.