Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will respond on behalf of the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton. It is estimated the Department of Social Protection will spend over €1 billion on working-age employment supports in 2013. This substantial expenditure, against a backdrop of significant fiscal consolidation, underlines the Government's commitment to enhancing support for activation and assisting people in returning to employment. Given the scale of the crisis, the key objective of activation policy and labour market initiatives is to offer assistance to those most in need of support in securing work and achieving financial self-sufficiency. This policy objective prioritises scarce resources for the benefit of those who are in receipt of qualifying welfare payments. Accordingly, the employment services and schemes provided by the Department are focused, in the first instance, on the cohort of unemployed people. The major elements of the Government's response are set out in the Pathways to Work policy, which is aimed at ensuring that as job vacancies are created they are filled by people on the live register. The Department maintains a particular focus on those who are long-term unemployed or at risk of becoming long-term unemployed.

The Government believes a work-first approach to activating the unemployed is better than a programme-first approach, given that many who sign on to the live register will exit it again within a short timeframe without any recourse to employment schemes or intensive activation measures. For example, in 2012, of those who signed on to the live register, 43% had left within three months of first signing on. Given these high exit rates, it is an efficient use of resources to use duration on the live register as a criterion for identifying those jobseekers who are most in need of additional support in order to re-enter employment.

The Department has a role in supporting people in moving from welfare to work. A range of employment support programmes are available to eligible unemployed people. These initiatives focus on allowing the long-term unemployed, lone parents and sickness-related welfare recipients to return to the active labour market by supporting them in participating in education, taking up employment or becoming self-employed.

A number of education and employment support schemes such as the back to education allowance, community employment schemes and the rural social scheme are also available to qualified adult social welfare recipients. The requirement to be in receipt of a relevant social welfare payment for a minimum period has always been a feature of employment support schemes and this is considered necessary to ensure that limited resources are directed at those most in need and where optimal benefit will arise for the individual.

It is recognised, however, that not all unemployed people, including those previously engaged in home duties, are dependent on the State for financial support. Some services, such as assistance with job-search activities and the use of online job-searching tools, are available to all unemployed persons, regardless of their duration of unemployment, if they register with the Department's employment services offices. Unemployed persons not in receipt of payments, including those recently engaged in home duties, may also be eligible to avail of skills improvement opportunities, for example, through FÁS training, but are not eligible to receive a training allowance while undertaking such training.

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