Ms Catherine Greene:

Deputy Brady was interested in what happened to people with whom Kildare ETB was working and who were then taken off our books. We had so many of these people, it was tragic. People who are familiar with the adult education system will know that we have some wonderful full-time and part-time programmes. Our voluntary training opportunities scheme offers those who have been unemployed for more than six months two years of full-time education to rebuild up to a QQI level 5 skill or sometimes level 6, depending on ability. That is a fantastic opportunity. We also offer part-time programmes which suit other people who may be back in work and are seeking to upskill.

I do not have a figure to hand for the number of people taken off the programme but it is available on our database. Large numbers of people were taken off the programme. The Intreo case officers tried to prevent people from being "turas nuaed", as they described it. They tried to ensure we could get them in time to be able to place them on a programme. In the case of the client I mentioned, I wanted him to go on a full-time programme but he had such a bad experience of education and his skills were so low that he did not have confidence. It was difficult enough to get him to agree to my part-time programme, which was perfect for him as it offered a mix of practical skills, including basic information technology, and improving communications skills. If he had taken the full-time programme, he would not have been "turas nuaed", so to speak. However, he did not understand the position, as many people do not understand it because they are so honest. These are people who are unemployed or who have just been made unemployed and are often vulnerable.

I refer to a question raised by Deputy Bríd Smith. We work with people who are on sickness benefits and people who have been sick for a very long time. Some of my clients have worked in these services and have been so run down by their experience that they are now out sick. We also work with many people who are not in receipt of payments to return them to employment through education.

To return to the people who have been "turas nuaed", the number was especially large in 2015 and 2016. We noticed a considerable change in what is happening this year, which frightens us even more. The client I referred to was not brought back to me but returned to Turas Nua yet again. Now, as he says, all he must do is go for a chat. It is very important for the companies that he sign in each time he does so because it enables them to get their money. However, he is not being asked to do anything. He is such a shy man and is so afraid that it suits him to have to go into the office in town once a month. What a ridiculous wasted opportunity to give him a chance of having a quality of life at the age of almost 64 years.

Several of our clients are working with but not engaging with Turas Nua. An example that very much upsets me involves a young man for whom I sought an educational assessment. He was with Turas Nua but did not engage with the company, although the staff member in Turas Nua working with him has been good and has tried to get him back. He has not attended meetings and has been sanctioned as a result. I am concerned that he is self-medicating for what he considers to be depression and other issues. He he is now off our books and everyone else's books. He is lost to society. That is happening over and over and it is a tragedy.

To answer the Deputy's wider question, there is work to be done by the local employment service. It was doing a very good job and we were working very closely with our partners in the Intreo service with which we do not have any difficulty. Intreo staff cannot speak out because we are all public servants in that sense. I am here speaking as the chair of the Adult Education Guidance Association of Ireland. Intreo staff do not support what is happening to the clients. The Department's Intreo cases officers know these people need education and training if they are to get jobs and would like to help them access such opportunities but cannot do so. I hope this programme will not continue for a further two years.

We were asked for our general vision. Deputy Thomas Byrne, who we met recently, told us he was reading about deskilling populations in America. This project is a deskilling. It is a contradiction of Government policy. The national skills strategy is the central strategy pursued by the Departments of Education and Skills and Business, Enterprise and Innovation with the support of IBEC and others. It aims to upskill people to the highest level possible. Everyone is on board with the strategy on which a bulletin was produced recently. Professor Brian MacCraith of Dublin City University is very good on the issue of artificial intelligence and a recent newspaper article cited the Taoiseach on the impact of artificial intelligence on jobs. The need for upskilling is very well known. Professor MacCraith argues that people need highly transferable skills, for example, customer service skills and emotional intelligence, which require a great deal of confidence to use. People learn to use emotional intelligence by building up confidence, engaging in education and acquiring qualifications. This provides people with transferable skills that they may use anywhere. As Professor MacCraith has said, for the new world order and for the new jobs that we do not even know exist, the qualities we need are emotional intelligence and empathy. However, the JobPath project takes people and keeps them in very low-skilled jobs.

I will give another example of a woman who stayed on the programme for one year. She wanted to come off the programme and hated the job she was in. She would ring me from the toilet at a startup company. She stayed the year because otherwise she would lose her rights and entitlements and would be unable to pay her rent. She was a wonderful person with some challenges who was doing this all on her own. On the day the scheme finished, she was made redundant. The idea was that she would be kept on in the job. She had a degree and during that year, I was about to get her on to a childcare programme. These are the types of tragedies taking place.

Our vision is that there would be joined-up thinking. My opening statement referred to the fragmented approach. The State educates us to a high level to deliver a very good service. The Intreo protocol with the Department of Employment and Social Protection was awarded to us, yet this project completely ignored it. I ask that the committee push for the review of guidance which was due last September and has been delayed. This would deliver the further education guidance strategy across all services. If there are highly skilled people working in Turas Nua who wish to join us or the local employment service, the service should be amalgamated so that there is a properly run, integrated further education training and guidance service for the country for the future. We are in relatively good times, but I have lived through the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s and have been through every recession in that period. My career was affected but I had some career resilience because I have good educational skills on which I could work. I have gone up, down and across the learning axis. I have been awarded a level 5 qualification in early childcare. My husband, who is a solicitor, lost his business in the crash. I am very proud of him. The rule has been changed but he was self-employed so he had to pay for training and became a carer. He has had the most satisfying period until he recently became ill. That is what is happening. We need to be able to go up, down and across the axis of learning. One cannot shove people into a progression route. That vision is possible. We have the people to deliver it and we have clients who desperately need the support and opportunities we can create.