Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am delighted that the Taoiseach referenced so often in his reply that not one hour has been wasted. He has been very focused. He has gone into an awful lot of detail, he said it numerous times, and specifics. In that context, I want to ask him one question. There are hundreds of thousands of people worried about their livelihoods. The Government has its July stimulus coming forward. As policymakers and as legislators, we do not have the information we need to plan for this crisis. The Central Statistics Office reports that just over 131,000 people were unemployed at the end of June, which is the seasonally adjusted, traditional unemployment figure of 5.8%. However, at the same time, it reports a Covid-19 adjusted unemployment rate of 22.5%. There is a world of difference between the two figures. I do not want figures to be massaged. Given all the specific, detailed work and the fact that not an hour has been wasted, I am sure that today, 7 July, the Taoiseach has the capacity to confirm - to the best of his knowledge, to be fair - what is the real unemployment rate as of today.

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