Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

SOLAS is not the successor to FÁS in respect of community employment schemes. The successor for those schemes is the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection. SOLAS received the training element when FÁS was broken up and the other element went elsewhere.

I will certainly convey to the Minister the strength of people's concerns about this. I do not think it is fair to portray it as welshing on an agreement because, as I understand it, FÁS was not at the Labour Court. The procedure used in the Labour Court was that a party went to be bound itself but the other party, FÁS, did not consent to the taking of the issue to the Labour Court for a determination.

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