Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)

I am sure the workers concerned will appreciate the expressions of sympathy from this Chamber, but they, like the almost 500,000 others out of work, take the view that sympathy is not enough. When did the Government first receive notice of these job losses which are significant in number? It would be astonishing if the story just fell fall from the sky. At this juncture is the Government satisfied that the terms and conditions of the redundancy packages are secure?

We should return to the issue of retraining and upskilling. The Minister has indicated that the priority for the Administration is job creation, but all the evidence speaks against this. There are stubbornly high numbers out of work and there has been minimal investment by the Government in job creation and protection measures. We have been told that we will see not a jobs initiative this month but other types of jobs plan from the Government. Where will these workers and workers from the banking sector feature in that scheme of things? If the experience of the construction sector is anything to go by, where vast numbers of workers find their sector a job-free zone, I imagine people in the banking sector are looking on in despair. What confidence can the Minister give to those workers today? What contact has there been with Government and what does the Minister propose to do in the first instance for this set of workers and then more broadly for the 500,000 people who are without work?

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