Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 25 May 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Social Protection

Community Employment Programme: SIPTU

Mr. Conor Mahon:

I think so. Like the Chairman said, the farrier role is almost an apprenticeship. That could be incorporated into the likes of CE. An individual we were dealing with recently went off to become a stonemason. It is our job to give him work experience so he can get work experience while being on a CE scheme. He has that parachute back and the safety net of the CE scheme and us looking after him and helping him with his forms, including HAP forms. At the same time, he is developing skills in the hope that he will eventually find employment. It was kind of a new venture for us but, again, there was only a limited amount of time that we could release him for work experience or incorporate him working with the employer while on CE without it impacting his payments. Eventually, his homelessness was borderline and he just came back to us because he was afraid to make that leap. We felt that could have been handled with the flexibility the Chairman spoke about. If we could have just negotiated that, we felt that person would have taken flight and would have survived.

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