John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

To date, 226,851 people have been referred to two private companies, Turas Nua and Seetec, under the JobPath programme. Some 27,476 people have been referred over for a second year. Some 354 people have been referred over for a third year. This means they are doing the same thing for a third year in succession. In response to a recent parliamentary question, the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection informed me that 51,548 of the 226,851 people who have been referred to these companies have commenced employment. Just 6% of those who have been referred - 14,617 people in total - have been sustained in employment for a year or more. I imagine that many of those people found employment independently of Turas Nua and Seetec, only for those companies to claim that they had assisted them in finding employment in order to get sustainment payments. Will the Taoiseach recognise that this project, which has cost the State €182 million to date, has been a complete failure? Will he honour the mandate provided by this Dáil when it supported a Sinn Féin motion in February that sought to stop referrals to Turas Nua and Seetec with immediate effect? Will he ensure the referrals stop and this failed project is binned once and for all?

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