Dáil debates

Tuesday, 12 March 2013

Job Creation and Economic Growth: Motion [Private Members]

 

9:00 pm

Photo of Sandra McLellanSandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Private Members' motion brought before the House by Sinn Féin. The issue of job creation is arguably one of the most pressing and important challenges that we as elected representatives face. In simple terms, people need work if they are to feed their families and put a roof over their heads. Work or employment gives people the material means to engage actively with all that society has to offer and to lead full and meaningful lives. In psychological terms, work or employment is a key determinant in a person's ability to maintain good mental health, a sense of self-esteem, pride and self-worth. Society places a high value on work and employment and one's identity and societal status is often determined by one's occupation or profession. At a more fundamental level, employment has a significant impact on one's socio-economic status and class position. This position will in turn determine access to life chances, social utilities, education, health etc. In other words, to engage in the many societal strands that give meaning to life in contemporary Ireland, one has to have work, employment, a job - call it what one wishes.

The reality is that almost 500,000 of our people are now out of work while thousands more have emigrated. The end result of this is that we now have a society that aptly fits the dictum of the haves and the have-nots. At one level we still see restaurants and bars in affluent and prosperous areas full of people who can afford to eat out on a night in the middle of the week. These are the very same people who shop for luxury goods in exclusive stores in our major cities. The other side of this coin is that children, lone parents, the working poor and people dependent on social transfers are now more than ever at risk of living in consistent poverty. Put another way, where one is located on the employment ladder, or if they are even on the ladder, will now more than ever determine their class position and the manner in which they will live their lives, be they adults or children.

We now have clear fault lines developing around socio-economic class in society. If we have even the faintest of concerns about issues of social cohesion, societal well-being and, dare I say, social justice then we cannot ignore such fractures. It is now a historical fact that the policies and actions of successive Fianna Fáil-led Governments played a major role in destroying the economic and employment infrastructure of our country. No matter how much Deputy Martin and his colleagues may try to disguise and ignore this fact, the record is clear. Fianna Fáil, Deputy Martin, Senator Thomas Byrne and others played Russian roulette with the lives and futures of hundreds of thousands of Irish men, women and children.

Fine Gael and Labour's response to the maelstrom has been nothing short of disastrous in that they too have decided to continue along the same lines as the previous Fianna Fáil-led Government. Clearly for all three parties, Fine Gael, Labour and Fianna Fáil, austerity is the only game in town. If by some misfortune one happens to be unlucky enough to lose one's job, or to be a child in a household experiencing unemployment, or to be one of the disabled or working poor, then tough because this Government does not really care.

This profound lack of human empathy and political acumen is clearly evident in the Government's recently launched Action Plan for Jobs 2013. The plan is to create 100,000 new jobs by 2016 and to provide credit to the small and medium-sized, SME, enterprise sector. The information technology, IT, sector and new industries will be the subject of renewed focus while the long-term unemployed are to be offered a range of incentives to upskill with the aim of finding work.

There are several problems with the plan, however. First, it makes no mention of annual targets for a net increase in jobs or a reduction in unemployment rates for this year. This is shocking given that almost 500,000 people are now out of work. What does the Government expect them to do? Flaky policies, procrastination and false hope do not put food on the table or help people to pay the mortgage. In the plan, the Government also gives an undertaking to commission research, monitor bank lending to SMEs and so on. These are actions that any government worth its salt would be doing as a matter of course.

Moreover, if one were foolish enough to believe the Government's spin around employment, then perhaps there might be reason to be optimistic. The reality, however, is far bleaker than Fine Gael and Labour would have us believe. For example, according to the coalition, its actions have resulted in the stabilisation of unemployment. In the real world, we know that levels of unemployment reached the bottom six months before the current Government came into power. Since then it has been virtually static even in the face of ever increasing emigration. Even more alarming is the fact that since the launch of the action plan, there has been a loss of 12,800 full-time jobs and a gain of 14,000 part-time jobs. Added to this, in the past year 9,100 jobs in the public sector have been lost. The bottom line is that since the announcement of the plan, 4,300 jobs have been lost and we are further away from the 100,000 target net jobs than at the start of the initiative.

More fundamentally, if we look at the structure of the labour market what we see is a worrying growth in low-paid, part-time, non-unionised labour which is primarily concentrated in the services sector. Meanwhile workers in construction, industry and agriculture have borne the brunt of the collapse of the economy. As if the collapse in the economy and the restructuring of the labour market were not enough, the policies of austerity that are being relentlessly and blindly enacted by the Government have led to a process of acute regional uneven development and the growth of a surplus population that has no work and few prospects. It is as if the Government is, to paraphrase Reginald Maudling, happy or content to live with an acceptable level of unemployment and emigration.

All the while we see, according to the Central Statistics Office, an increase in levels of child poverty and in the numbers of people living in consistent poverty. We now live in a State where the Government thinks it is acceptable to cut mobility allowances for disabled people and to cut the working hours of thousands of home helps. All of this is done under the mantra of austerity. Meanwhile, 60% of the unemployed have been out of work for 24 months or more with all the evidence suggesting this pattern will continue.

The Sinn Féin jobs document provides a clear alternative to the false projections in the coalition's jobs plan. There are choices and austerity is not one of them.

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