Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

Responsibility for the CE schemes transferred to the Department of Social Protection along with the FÁS employment services. I am very committed to the role of CE schemes. As I have said previously, they provide very valuable social services. We need to consider the quality of experience people gain on the schemes. We must also seek value for money. As the Deputy is aware all areas of my Department have been targeted for savings. However, the troika takes a detailed interest in what one might call the activation and employment support policies of the Department of Social Protection. I am anxious that in the conversations with the troika we get recognition of the important social aspect of the schemes for communities. As the Deputy is aware several reviews of CE have been conducted. CE is principally identified as an employment activation measure with the hope of a person completing a CE scheme and shortly afterwards getting a job external from the CE scheme. All the studies have shown - all of us would know this from our personal experience - that depending on the type of scheme, that may not happen. The literature on CE schemes regards them as a simple activation measure. Given that the responsibility for the schemes has transferred to my Department, we should acknowledge their social role and build it into the assessment of the schemes. Some schemes or elements of some schemes constitute social employment, which is very valuable. However, that can be very different from a pure labour activation role. When the review is concluded and as we get the data, that is one of the issues we will examine very closely.

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