Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

County Donegal has a live register of 7% and it is not the only county with high unemployment statistics. Across rural Ireland people ask that we keep the participants on the schemes longer because they cannot get new people to fill them. We are revisiting the CE scheme with FÁS. My one worry is for unskilled workers who may be vulnerable to globalisation and the shift of low-cost manufacturing outside the country. Their re-employability is an issue if we do not upskill. That is why we have allocated substantial resources to FÁS to move on the one-step-up initiative and to get people upskilled in the workplace. In-company training will be a significant part of that into the future.

I agree with Deputy Andrews and the tempered language he so often exemplifies should be a model for the rest of us.

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