Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

I also want to focus on the question of quality employment. I will return to some of the questions I posed to the Taoiseach yesterday, on which I received no answers, regarding the so-called work placement experience programme, which is a new free labour scheme for employers where workers will get less than the pandemic unemployment payment, PUP, and are expected to live below the poverty line while working. It is JobBridge 2.0. The truth of the scheme is that workers who are on it will get an extra €3.43 per hour for working 30 hours a week without a guaranteed job at the end of it.

I also asked the Taoiseach to confirm that bosses can have up to ten workers in the scheme without paying a penny and whether he agrees it indicates that this can discourage the creation of real jobs, as did JobBridge 1.0. Does he agree that it will act to create a downward pressure on wages? If employers can take someone on for free then why would they agree to increase wages?

Finally, I wish to ask about the role of private contracted companies in handling cases. The scheme sets out that this will be policed by new caseworkers and the Pathways to Work strategy talks about expanding the role of private contractor companies, like we have seen with Seetec, and Turas Nua. What are the plans to outsource the case officers for the new JobBridge 2.0?

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