Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 and 2 together.

Pathways to Work is a new approach to the provision of services to unemployed people, the objective of which is to reduce the level of long-term unemployment and, in so doing, to ensure the overall level of unemployment will reduce as the economy returns to growth.

In developing the policy the Government is acutely aware that the level of long-term unemployment at approximately 40% and unemployment among young people at approximately 30% could, as in previous recessions, become embedded and persist past the economic upturn. The Government is determined not to let this happen. There are two major elements to the Government's response – the action plan for jobs and pathways to work. The goal of the action plan for jobs is to create new jobs and the goal of Pathways to Work is to help ensure that as many as possible of those jobs, and other job vacancies, get filled by people from the live register.

Pathways to Work has five major strands. They include, more regular and ongoing engagement with people who are unemployed; greater targeting of activation places and opportunities; incentivising the take-up of opportunities; incentivising employers to provide more jobs for people who are unemployed; and reforming institutions to deliver better services to people who are unemployed.

The project plan for the National Employment and Entitlements Service, NEES, was approved by Government last June. Since then considerable progress has been made and the transfer of the community welfare service, CWS, and the FÁS employment service were completed on schedule in October 2011 and January 2012, respectively. The Department is now developing the new integrated service as set out in Pathways to Work. The new integrated service will be piloted from four office locations in May of this year and extended to a further ten offices by the end of the year.

As the question suggested, the roll-out of the new service will be very challenging for my Department and will require the allocation of additional internal staff and external resources to employment services and activation work. The transfer of approximately 1,700 staff from the CWS and FÁS, the majority of whom have significant experience in working with clients in a case management model has enhanced the capabilities of the Department in this regard. In addition, the Department is also engaged in a programme of systems development and process change that should enable staff from within its own resources to be deployed in accordance with the new model.

The use of external resources, including private sector providers of employment services, will be also considered. It must be noted however that the use of external resources is nothing new - the Department, previously FÁS, engages approximately 23 local employment service, LES, providers to provide employment services including job coaching, mentoring, and job search assistance to the people who are long-term unemployed and funds those activities to the value of €20 million per annum. Currently, approximately 300 staff are engaged by LES companies in the provision of employment services. The Department also has similar external contract arrangements in place to cater for the requirements of clients with disabilities who wish to return to the workforce.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House.

With regard to the use of private sector providers, the use of such providers is being evaluated by the Department. As part of this process the Department has reviewed the experience in a number of other countries and has met or had telephone conferences with its counterparts in France, the Netherlands, the UK, Germany and Norway. The Department has also met with Professor Dan Finn from the centre for social inclusion at the University of Portsmouth. Professor Finn is an acknowledged expert in the area of contracting public employment services. It is clear from the work done to date that the use of private sector providers is common throughout OECD countries with different models in place in different states. No firm proposals have been developed as yet but if, and when, such proposals are developed the issues raised by the experience of other countries will inform the approach taken by the Department and the issues raised by the Deputies will be also considered.

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