Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

On FÁS, I totally agree that the updating of skills will be a major part of the future of industry. That has been highlighted in many reports. In the national development plan a huge amount has been set aside for the upskilling of the existing workforce. We have a large workforce and this year has been a good year for manufacturing industry. Some other sectors may have been under pressure but it was a good year for manufacturing. Its future success depends on its ability to upskill quickly with good equipment.

I do not deal with FÁS on a daily basis, as I did in the past, but the organisation also has an input from sectors tied to third level education and should be able to do this. The skills evaluation report earlier this year highlighted some of what we must do in terms of training. FÁS is a large organisation with many employees and it should be up to doing it. The necessary efforts should be put in by FÁS because it has the budget, the network of offices and training centres and associations with industry and third level institutions.

Can the system be improved? The skills evaluation report showed that we must continually retrain, upskilling our people, if we are to stay at the cutting edge of new technology. FÁS is not the only organisation doing that, in-company training in the private sector is hugely important for those companies spending large amounts in the manufacturing, pharmaceutical and other sectors. That requires resources in the public sector. FÁS is a suitable public sector organisation for this but it should take full account of the skills evaluation report.

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