Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

FÁS has a budget of €1 billion per year. Last year the Minister stated 51,500 people were referred to the agency by her Department of whom 2,763 were referred to employment and training programmes and 866 to further education. Approximately 3,600 people, therefore, were referred further by an agency with a budget of €1 billion. I appreciate it is engaged in other activities but its core function is to assist the unemployed to return to work. By any measure, that is a failure.

The Minister stated twice she appointed 50 facilitators during the summer to work with lone parents and the unemployed on a one-to-one basis, which means each facilitator must carry a caseload of 8,000 people. How can one person deal with 8,000 people and give them an opportunity to leave the live register and return to work?

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