Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will pick up on Deputy Ó Cathasaigh's point about the rural social scheme and retrofitting. There is certainly potential for the RSS to be involved in community-based retrofitting projects. It needs that community-based link. However, the big potential in retrofitting could be in community employment because it has a training element whereas RSS does not. There were to be four ETB centres of excellence in retrofitting around the country. I think they are all established now. Some of the retrofitting proposed in the Government's plan published last week is shallow retrofitting. People can be trained in that in relatively short courses. There is potential for community employment participants to take retrofitting courses that can be undertaken in a relatively short period and ultimately go into employment, which is a big aim of community employment schemes.