Pat Casey (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Social protection is a massive part of Government expenditure, the second biggest after health. Welfare for citizens remains the biggest part of Government expenditure although we were supposed to be keeping the recovery going, according to Fine Gael.

In a brave move, Fianna Fáil fought this election on increased public services. We did not campaign for a selfish society based on tax cuts, privatisation and the rampant individualism endorsed by a liberalism that does not regard welfare as a means to help people in need but as a stick to keep them down. That is the fundamental difference between our parties. It has always been there and maybe it always will be, but that does not alter the fact that we need radical change so as to ensure that welfare becomes protection for the people who need it.

This is crucial in respect of two issues on which I will concentrate. The first relates to the labour market supports that the Department oversees. Job benefit and job assistance payments are a direct means of providing financial help to the unemployed. Thankfully, the unemployment figures are going in the right direction. I give credit to the Minister for his role in that achievement, but two traps will become embedded unless a radical change in thinking and action is undertaken.

Youth unemployment and long-term unemployment rates remain too high and supports for this sector are piecemeal, inadequate and, in certain areas, counterproductive. While I accept that youth unemployment supports involve much more than direct payments and the Government is moving towards labour activation models with training and further education, these moves are too incoherent and are not focused towards the needs of the individual who finds himself or herself unemployed.

Long-term unemployed people are also being treated as statistical numbers to be played around with by political spin doctors along with an inhumane, bureaucratic and computerised system that at times has lost all sense of the human suffering involved in long-term unemployment. People who are unemployed are our fellow citizens. They are human beings who require help and should not be trampled on by an uncaring system. Has the Minister of State ever spent a day in a social protection office? Has he seen the security windows, the stressed and overworked staff? The offices do not look like places that inspire hope. In too many instances, they are depressing, paper-pushing systems designed to produce data. They are not there to help people who need their services at a vulnerable time in their lives.

Good work is being done, however. There are some excellent people in the Department of Social Protection and on the ground who are a credit to the best of the public service, but speaking with them has proven to me that they are overworked and overburdened by a system that is beyond breaking point.

The community employment system is under significant strain and has been under sustained attack by Fine Gael since it entered office in 2011. Community employment schemes in mid-Leinster have the highest progression record in the country of all back to work schemes. Why is this not being celebrated and endorsed? Why are we pushing ahead with the privatisation of these schemes when the community employment and rural social scheme models are examples of empowerment and community involvement that should be supported, not consistently and relentlessly attacked by the Government?

I know of too many stories of long-term unemployed people who are depressed and flattened by their treatment at the hands of an uncaring system. The Government's privatisation efforts are wrong. The data for progression are still not available for this new departure, but I have evidence that too many people have had a negative experience with the service. It needs to be discontinued at the earliest opportunity.

The Minister for Social Protection is an ambitious man by all accounts. He is a follower of international political developments. He is well aware of the democratic rejection of establishment politics that is taking place across the world. One of the key reasons for this rejection in Ireland is that too many good people feel rejected by the Government and Government services. Rural areas and those in need of Government services are not being listened to. Their politicians are unable to change the situation even when they want to try.

Social protection must live up to its name, not be a centralised, bureaucratic and computerised Government system. Empower people. Give communities back the means to help all of their neighbours. Stop reinforcing a failed bureaucratic and uncaring system.

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