Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I support the motion. The Government's stance is mind-boggling. The tendering process does not make sense and the community not-for-profit model must be preserved and not dismantled. I find it hard to understand why the Government would do something like this from a community point of view, a jobs point of view and a political point of view. Taking the decision to commercialise these schemes and introducing targets and quotas and commissions means that staff will have little incentive to ask what is actually best for a person coming through their doors and would seek to make a profit from them. It will cause a loss of jobs. Groups such as NEWKD, South Kerry Development Partnership and IRD Duhallow have gathered knowledge and skills over the past 25 years and have become experts in career guidance. They have guided our communities through the financial crash and subsequent Government austerity measures.

Since 2008, more than 2,000 people have gone through the doors of the South Kerry Development Partnership. The organisation never said no to them. It kept its doors open when everyone else was turning people away and suggesting they go to Australia. It trained these people and brought them back into the jobs market. The Government says that there is nothing it can do, which translates as "there is nothing it will do". The Government says it has legal advice. The Minister has seen the legal advice that states the Government is not obliged to tender.

These schemes, such as the rural social scheme, have been of great benefit to rural communities. They support the essence of community work, activities such as driving buses, taking the elderly to centres and maintaining sports grounds. Kerry social farming has also seen massive success. The six-year rule will send men in south Kerry away from fulfilling, life-enhancing work in their communities that gives them a sense of pride and return them to the dole, leaving them with nothing to do in these isolated areas and limited social interaction. Why pay them to stay at home? Why not keep them on the schemes? The Minister should admit now that this is a mistake. Who is going to do the community work in deeply rural areas when her 2017 payment structure rules are in force? Rather than helping employers to get cheap labour and introducing a system she knows will fail - and the Minister has heard the statistics in that regard - she should broaden and top up the schemes. She should commission an independent review. A 2009 report said that for every €1 spent, the quantifiable benefits amount to €2.89. The Minister should act now for her own sake.

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