Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 16 February 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation

Pre-legislative Scrutiny of the General Scheme of the Employment Permits (Consolidation and Amendment) Bill 2019

Ms Fiona Ward:

The system is evidence-based. We are guided by the research undertaken by the skills and labour market research unit, the National Skills Bulletin, the Vacancy Overview report, reviews, submissions, public consultation and the input of relevant policy Departments and the economic migration interdepartmental group. We look at where the labour challenges are. We seek to ensure that where occupations are eligible for an employment permit, that is based on evidence that there are genuine labour challenges in terms of recruitment and that it is not linked to terms and conditions or retention issues. Sectors make submissions to the twice-yearly review on an ongoing basis and unless the evidence is there and we are satisfied by the whole-of-government approach that the shortages are genuine and there are not any structural issues, we will not remove an occupation from the eligible list. It is an evidence-based system. The ESRI did some research through the European Migration Network in 2015, which found that Ireland is one of the leaders in Europe in linking labour market intelligence to our economic migration policy.

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