Mr. Tony Donohoe:

I think we have explored the issue in some depth. I thank the committee for the opportunity to do so. If I was to leave one thought, it is that individuals need employment security rather than job security. I think that security is the key as we are in such an uncertain world. Change is driven by technology, globalisation and so on. Notwithstanding what we are seeing in the US and the UK, these are pretty powerful forces that we might put a break on for a while but which will re-establish themselves. The workplace will be changing all the time. One will see the churn, as it were, in jobs.

It is around equipping people with the attributes to survive in that uncertain world.

I support Dr. Kara McGann's point that the way to do that is through early intervention. One can trace the quality of the early childhood interventions right up to the propensity for lifelong learning. The type of employment a person will get is geographically based, as the Chairman mentioned. Three of us sit on the Labour Market Council and we are wrestling with the idea of jobless households and how one approaches that. The defining characteristic of jobless households in Ireland is the number of children. Jobless households affect all the many children living in them. That is to support the point made by Ms Mulligan around the early intervention with children.

I am sure members will have picked up from the contributions that it is around the connectedness of services. When agencies answer to different Departments, different motherships, there is always the likelihood of them getting disconnected when dealing with geographic unemployment hotspots and the jobless household phenomenon. The impact of these factors is multifaceted. It is everything from mental health through to education. Many different Departments are involved and that has to be brought together. I suspect it is on a geographic basis. I have seen a project that ran for about ten years. I am not sure it if still running. It is called the youngballymun strategy, which tried to connect up the services.