Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)

I support everything Deputies Penrose and Sherlock have said about how we should deal with the serious crisis that is affecting the Irish and international economies. It is hitting Ireland a little harder than other countries, unfortunately. From the outset, most people said that our economy could not keep going the way it was going. However, the Government did not think the day would ever dawn when it would have to deal with a serious issue.

The human face of this crisis is the plight of the unemployed. I will speak about the unemployed in the area I know best. I am sure the Members of the House can tell their own stories. According to the most recent figures, some 11,575 people in Cork city are unemployed. I am sure that number has increased since those figures were compiled. The figures in question represent an increase of 46% on the same period last year. When I try to imagine what large numbers of people might look like, I take a look around this Chamber. While it is a fairly small enclosure, it is significant in that it houses 166 people. In that context, one can imagine what 11,500 people would look like. It is the size of a small town. Most of the people in question have mortgages, children and dependents. They probably have a mother or a father in a nursing home. They have to make their car repayments and send their children to school. We do not have free education in this country. They have many responsibilities. One can imagine what happens when they are made unemployed. When they go to the social welfare office, they are told that staffing difficulties mean they will have to wait up to three months for their first payment. The office in Cork was always under-staffed, even in good times. Their next port of call is the community welfare office, which has not benefited from an increase in staffing. Community welfare officers will have to deal with all of those people until the Department of Social and Family Affairs gets its act together. What is happening is quite incredible. This is the human face of the problem.

I am frightened by some of the measures the Government put in place in the recent budget. I wish to refer to the letter one is handed when one becomes unemployed and presents oneself at the desk in one's local social welfare office. Under the heading "duration of payment", the letter states that if one has paid less than 260 PRSI contributions since one first started working, and if one continues to satisfy all the conditions for receiving unemployment benefit, which is now known as jobseeker's benefit, one will be paid for 312 days. One will be paid for 390 days, or 15 months, if one has paid 260 or more PRSI contributions. I ask Deputies to note the 312 and 390 figures, in particular.

I wish to refer to the Social Welfare Bill and the budget fact sheet which have been published by the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Deputy Hanafin, and her Department. The section of the fact sheet dealing with jobseeker's benefit — once again, I note the change in its title — states that the benefit will be now paid for 12 months, rather than 15 months as it was previously, to people who have paid 260 or more PRSI contributions. According to the fact sheet, this change will apply to new claimants and those with an existing duration of less than six months on jobseeker's benefit on budget day, 14 October 2008. Jobseeker's benefit will be paid for up to nine months, rather than 12 months as it was previously, where fewer than 260 contributions are paid. This will apply to new claimants and those with an existing duration of less than three months on jobseeker's benefit.

The whole point of these changes is to ensure that people who are claiming what is now known as jobseeker's benefit will not be able to avail of the terms outlined in the original letter to which I referred. Such people are under the impression that they will receive the benefit for 12 or 15 months, depending on the level of contributions they have paid. What will happen to them? Is this the first time the Government has introduced a social welfare payment instrument retrospectively? Will the people in question be given a further letter, telling them that the conditions under which they paid PRSI contributions and first claimed jobseeker's benefit have now changed? If such a change is to be made, it will be through no fault of the people to whom I refer. The change is resulting from the mismanagement of this Government. Are the people in question to be told that the conditions have changed, and they will not get the final three months of jobseeker's benefit payments they were expecting? I do not think that would be legal. I do not think the Government will be allowed to do that. I ask the Government to use the Finance Bill to restore the conditions under which those people paid PRSI contributions and first signed up for jobseeker's benefit. It was Warren Buffett who once said that it is only when the tide goes out that one sees who is swimming naked. The tide has gone out on the Government and it is not a pretty sight.

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