The launch of the First Steps developmental internship programme and the JobsPlus variant for young people required the passage of that legislation. The legislation also permitted the introduction of earlier and more intensive engagement by Intreo with the young unemployed as compared with older unemployed people.

Under a related initiative, the EURES unit of the Department, which is part of the European employment service network, is currently implementing the Experience Your Europe, EYE, programme. It operates in parallel with a broader "Your First EURES Job" initiative at European level to offer young unemployed people support in taking up employment, work experience and training in other EU countries. Under the scheme, EURES Ireland can fund some of the training, travel, re-location costs and-or living costs incurred by jobseekers undertaking up to 12 months of training and work experience abroad. The total budget for the scheme this year is €2.3 million. Under the co-sponsored placement programme element, young jobseekers between the ages of 18 to 24 are sponsored by an Irish-based company and placed in a partner company in another European country for up to 12 months to gain experience, for example, language skills. Two pilot projects of this programme commenced in May 2015 resulting in placements in the Netherlands and Germany, with further placements planned in Denmark and Poland in the coming weeks. The numbers on these are still small but further development and extension of these EYE projects will be informed by the outcome of a review due to take place before the end of this year.

Overall, taking new and existing measures into account, expenditure on programmes providing employment, training and further education opportunities for young people is estimated to be in excess of €500 million in each of the years 2014 and 2015. We have provided a table setting out the final participation figures for these programmes in 2014. It is appended to the statement. As noted earlier, the uptake on programmes was more than 23,000 as compared with the 28,000 overall intended provision. The lower numbers are partly as a result of the fact that the programmes are demand led. As my colleague mentioned, participation on programmes such as JobBridge is entirely voluntary and is therefore led by demand from young people and employers. The lower numbers are also partly due to delays due to the legislative requirement I mentioned earlier.

With regard to funding, of the €500 million expected to be spent in each of those two years, the European Social Fund and the European youth initiative are expected to contribute approximately €60 million a year of the €500 million, which is slightly over 10% of expenditure.