Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The first thing I did when I became the Minister for Social Protection was ask the chief medical office whether he had evidence on the effect of unemployment on people's health. His stark one-page reply stated that people who are unemployed suffered increased mortality and morbidity, visit the doctor more and take more medication, etc. He also made the interesting point that securing employment provides a 99% cure. Employment is part of human existence. We are programmed in our DNA to work so why tell one community that its is more or less excluded from employment?

I do not believe that community employment, Tús and other schemes are the limit for anybody. As far as I am concerned, a human's limit should be where he or she wants to go and where he or she is capable of going. We should give people the maximum opportunity to go there. However, we must recognise that we have a cohort of people who have been so disadvantaged in life that to even get useful employment doing useful work in a State-supported system is hugely important. The key point the witnesses made was that the next generation benefits hugely from their parents being out working. That was my life's experience. An emphasis must be placed on the individual but we must consider what will create the best opportunity for each individual and tailor to the realities.