Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move:

"That Dáil Éireann:

acknowledges:

— the commitment, hard work and professionalism of those working in Job Clubs and Local Employment Services (LESs) across the State, many of whom have given twenty-five years of service to the communities in which they serve; and

— the importance and value that not-for-profit, community-based job activation services provide for users, especially for those furthest from the labour market;

notes:

— the Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands' report entitled "Examination of Employment Services" which recommends the continuation of Job Clubs and LESs in their current format;

— support from both the Mayor of Dublin, Alison Gilliland and the Mayor of Cork, Colm Kelleher for Job Clubs and LESs;

— the failure of the current payment by results service, JobPath, provided by Turas Nua Limited and Seetec Limited; and

— that of the 376,964 people referred to JobPath between July 2015 and July 2021 just over 26,000 found employment which lasted for at least 52 weeks, a success rate to date of 7 per cent, at a cost to the taxpayer of €275 million;

further notes:

— the Department of Social Protection's decision to tender out the services currently provided by Job Clubs and LESs is based on an unpublished report carried out by the Institute for Employment Studies in England, unseen legal advice, and European Union (EU) procurement rules;

— that EU procurement rules clearly state that there is no obligation on any Member State to contract out the provision of services that they wish to provide themselves or to organise this by means other than public contracts;

— that many Job Clubs, local partnerships and Local Development Companies currently providing employment services were unable to participate in Phase One of the Request for Tender due to the tender restrictions or did not tender as they could not meet the financial commitments related to same;

— that existing employment service providers have raised serious concerns regarding the design of Request for Tender 1, the impact the proposed changes will have on employment services and the potential job losses it poses to this sector; and

— that there are 26 LESs and 40 Job Clubs in existence with 307 full-time equivalent posts in LESs and 81 full-time equivalent posts in Job Clubs, a total workforce of 388; and

calls on the Government to:

— protect the not-for-profit and community-based ethos of employment services;

— suspend all plans to tender out employment services;

— establish a stakeholder forum between the Minister for Social Protection and representatives from Job Clubs and LESs to examine the current services, identify issues of concern and bring forward solutions that will allow current services to be maintained;

— examine the possibility of merging Job Clubs in their existing structure and LESs, as recommended by the 2018 Indecon International Economic Consultants reports which commended both services; and

— divert Department funding set aside for the new employment services to expand LESs."

Given the number of times I have raised this issue with the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Heather Humphreys, I hope she knows that this motion is brought forward in good faith and I hope she will keep an open mind to the case being put forward in it. I bring this motion on behalf of the more than 380 staff in local employment services and job clubs throughout the State, many of whom have given up to 20 and 25 years of service to their communities and are highly skilled and educated with vast experience. I am proud to bring forward this motion having met and engaged with many of those workers. I do so as someone who firmly believes in the not-for-profit community-based ethos of the job clubs and the local employment services, LESs.

When the plan to tender out these existing LES and job club services became apparent, we were repeatedly told this was a legal requirement due to EU procurement laws and I presume this is an argument that will be put forward by many Government Deputies in this debate. Yet, the same EU directive is crystal clear in stating that no member state is obliged "to contract out...the provision of services that they wish to provide themselves or to organise by means other than public contracts". Legal advice sought by the Irish Local Development Network, ILDN, from a leading law firm in Ireland confirmed this and concluded that the Department is not required to tender out these services. This legal advice was shared with the Minister. She is aware of it. The ILDN has written to the Minister on three occasions and she has yet to respond.

Added to this is the fact that the unpublished report from the Institute for Employment Studies in England, which the Minister contracted to review all current public employment services and to propose a new design, was clear that a decision needed to be made on whether to use powers to reserve the award of some or all of the contracts for non-profits. The Minister made that decision, which she was neither obliged nor required to. Even if it was the case that she was legally obliged, she was legally obliged to bring forward a public and open competition tender for these services. She was not obliged to dismantle and change the current model entirely. She was not obliged to move from a not-for-profit to a for-profit model. That was a decision the Minister made.

The Minister has also repeatedly cited advice from the Comptroller and Auditor General. A recent letter I received from the Comptroller and Auditor General confirmed that a different contracted service was brought to the Department's attention as not being compliant with procurement and the Department then expanded the non-compliant procurement disclosure to the LES and job clubs. The Institute for Employment Studies also warned that if the Minister were to open the market to full competition, it would clearly need to be done carefully in order to maintain the support of stakeholders and command political support. What stakeholders support the Minister in what she is doing? Who are those stakeholders? As regard to commanding political support, the Minister will know that the cross-party Oireachtas committee on social protection looked at all this. We brought in those involved, including officials from the Department, and recommended that the LES and job clubs remain in their current form.

The same report on which the Minister has based many of her new proposals for employment services also stated that requiring financial qualifications criteria will likely make it more difficult for many existing providers to achieve a pass. The report recommended that the Minister set low financial criteria thresholds and offer an advanced payment to level the playing field, as they put it. The Minister did neither. She required an annual turnover for the four lots that have already gone through phase 1 of between €1.2 million and €1.9 million for community not-for-profit organisations that have charitable status. They were locked out of phase 1 of this tender process. The economist Jim Power, on looking at the first phase of the tender, concluded that the proposed model is for-profit and that the model put forward in phase 1 is "not likely to prove viable for charitable not-for-profit companies" and that is exactly what has happened.

Many issues have been highlighted in phase 1 of the tender process, such as the annual turnover about which the Minister was warned in the institute's report more than a year ago. The Minister also said in the Chamber last week that she has done everything "to ensure the importance of social value and community linkages are reflected in the procurement process." I would love to know how private companies Seetec or Turas Nua proved or showed any link to the community or social values, and perhaps the Minister will share that with us. We have seen what privatisation has done to employment services. We have seen it through JobPath, which has had a success rate of 7% in the last six years. Of the more than 370,000 people referred to it, there was a cost to the taxpayer of €275 million for 7% of those people to be sustained in a job for 52 weeks at least. What the Minister is doing is a mistake. I ask that she look at it again. Everybody involved has asked that she look at it again. The staff on the ground in the local employment services are not happy. The Minister is aware of that and she needs to listen. There are no stakeholders on board with what she is doing and the vast majority of Members of this House are not on board either. This motion asks the Minister to look at this again and I ask her to consider that.

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