Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)

This section is tied to the reduction in employers' PRSI. What is proposed is very strange, particularly in view of the fact that activation measures such as education, training, etc., are required and in light of the constraints on the public purse. It is bizarre that we are reducing the national training fund levy. The amount involved - a reduction from 0.7% to 0.35% - is minuscule in some ways. However, the money being lost to the Exchequer could easily have been spent on enhancing some of the projects to which we referred previously, namely, the Tús programme, the internship programme, the extension or expansion of the community employment programme or a programme to allow apprentices complete their courses. In the context of the latter programme, hundreds if not thousands of apprentices have been adversely affected as a result of the collapse of the construction industry and now find themselves half or three quarters of the way through their courses. The levy to which I refer was used in the past to fund specific programmes run by FÁS, IDA Ireland, Shannon Development and Enterprise Ireland and this could have been done again.

I am not fully aware of how the national training fund levy was divided or whether the money involved was ring-fenced. If it was not ring-fenced, the very least we should do is ensure that even the reduced amount for which provision is being made in the Bill will be protected. The levy should be ring-fenced and should be used to create additional training places and opportunities in order that people might upskill.

Those are my concerns. I am not going to press the matter to a vote but I ask that the Minister - in light of the small nature of the reduction - explain the logic behind this section in comparison to that which applies in respect of the reduction in employers' PRSI.

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