Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)

I apologise for being a little late and I thank my colleague for taking on the debate. There was a misunderstanding with the timing. I welcome this motion from the Labour Party, which concerns a very important issue. I spoke last week on small businesses and this is another issue I am afraid the Government is just not getting. We must act on it.

We stood here in February and March 2008 with colleagues in the Labour Party and others on this side of the House discussing these problems. Long before the black July, as it has been called, we highlighted the problem of rising unemployment but nobody wanted to listen. It was to be put to one side. Since then there has been inaction from the Government.

We are calling for imagination and new ideas to keep people in employment. We know jobs might not pay as well as they did and that is probably the way life has gone but we must keep people in employment both for financial and social reasons. With a bit of imagination there is no reason we cannot invent new labour activation schemes to try to match people with great skills with jobs that must be done in our communities, towns and throughout the country. Much work needs to be done but much will be left incomplete.

This is the time to act rather than dwell in self-pity and hope our fortunes pick up next year. At the announcement of the last budget, the Government predicted unemployment would probably only reach 8% by the end of this year when the dog in the street knew it could be double that figure. Sadly, there will be 500,000 people unemployed by Christmas, although quite a number would be greatly skilled and want to work. We must find ways to employ them.

I have said to previous Ministers that there are courses of action. The community employment schemes can be expanded for certain individuals and new activation schemes can be introduced. There is any number of schools to be built out there; rather than spending millions on renting prefabs every year and social welfare payments, the two issues should be combined in one budget in order to build classrooms. We should do something in order to look back at these dark times and say that we made some progress in certain areas.

Many of our towns have suffered from bad planning and as a result are missing out on parks, playgrounds and so on. This is a chance to put teams of people together to go into areas and spend time to make them attractive by developing parklands and walkways. The social welfare funding could be supplemented in order to make this activity more attractive to people.

In my own town of Navan there are 100 acres that will sit idle because there is no money to develop it. Planning permission has been obtained for the project and the land was bought years ago so it is ready for the off. It will sit idle because it cannot be developed due to lack of funding, while at the same time thousands of people are being added to our dole queues. Not every one of them would like to partake in such an activity but I am sure there would be enough to work if we could use our imagination and use existing funding in a different fashion. If we could do so, that park could be up and running. That is one idea and I am sure there are plenty more across the country. We must act on them.

The Labour Party includes a reference to subsidising employment in the motion, which we should absolutely do. For many years during the good times, businesses dealing with carpets, for example, were leaving the country and businesses were closing because they lacked competitiveness. Although we felt we did not need to do so, there was an opportunity to subsidise or grant-aid those companies but we must do it now. There is no point in people losing their jobs because their employer cannot afford to pay their wages - which they could if they got a top-up from social welfare - or they cannot get credit from a bank.

Spending money on social welfare must be done as a stop-gap measure but we could get much more benefit from it. People could also benefit both financially and socially by having such money spent on bringing about employment. There is no reason we cannot work with employers and subsidise them.

I know the Taoiseach met with Mr. Jack O'Connor and others to discuss this matter but that is only a full year and half after the problem arose. The reason most of the recent Private Members' motions concerned employment and small businesses is because the Opposition wants to force the issue to targeting money to keep people in jobs and in community employment schemes.

While there is not much I admire in how China functions, I will admit it has ways of ensuring everyone is at work. While we may not agree with how it is done and that people are not paid enough, it is productive and keeps the Chinese economy going. We must keep people in the labour force at work and making a contribution to society. That is what the majority of those who recently lost their jobs want to do.

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