Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The priority for this Government is to get people into employment. We have an unemployment rate which is far too high. The biggest problem the country is currently facing is the issue of unemployment. People are finishing school and coming out of colleges but cannot get work. That is an enormous problem for the individuals concerned, their families and society. We must address it and are doing so at a number of levels. We are encouraging inward investment with the creation of jobs, and putting in place a range of measures that will provide employment opportunities and experience for people who would not otherwise get it. One of the ways of doing it is by the recruitment of 1,000 graduate nurses in our health service. It is about putting people into employment, nothing else. That is what is intended here.

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