Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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This question is to discuss the employment-related issues concerning community employment, CE, schemes supervisors and assistant supervisors. There is an issue around pensions also and there are a range of issues which have cropped up over the years that have never been fully addressed. One of the main ones is that most CE supervisors' jobs are benchmarked in the wrong way and it is not a proper recognition of the qualifications that are required, the activities they are forced to undertake and the job specification.

I have a copy of the job specification here, which I believe it is slightly out of date. Very few job specifications, however, would have so many parts of it outlined with such specific requirements. I am surprised, therefore, that they manage to get anybody through the process of becoming a supervisor on that basis because they are expected to do so much. That may perhaps be because the CE supervisor is a role which captures quite a good deal, given the CE programme itself does so much. I am not criticising the scheme; that is a debate for another day. There is the need to repurpose it and, in some ways, to get the Department of Social Protection separated from it, because there is too much concentration on job progression and not on community support.

However, as I said, that is a different debate. Today's debate is about the supervisors themselves and the fact that they have had very limited, if any, increases in pay. They are dependent on the Government to set the rates of pay and to issue the funding through the Department of Social Protection to the sponsor organisation. Basically, the Government or the Department is the shadow employer, but we cannot negotiate with a shadow employer, as we would do otherwise. That is why the supervisors rely on me and sometimes the unions to go into the Labour Court. The problem is that they should not have to do that. There should be some type of negotiations to look after supervisors, some of whom are 20 years in the job, who are at the highest point of the increment scale. The scale has only four points and then a person is stuck, which makes supervisors feel devalued. An additional focus and workload is put on them. Those who are coming in at that level are now required to have a Bachelor of Arts degree or level 7 equivalent. Unlike in the past, there is no recognition of a change from a level 6 to level 7. There was not an increase in pay or recognition for that. Neither was there an increase for the additional work in terms of the bureaucratic work that is now associated with the job, albeit on computers. However, in the past supervisors did not have to fill out as many forms by hand.

A range of issues is associated with the fact that the job of a community employment supervisor is not permanent. If the number of participants in a scheme drops, which has happened in places around the country, it means the job of a supervisor can be endangered and there is no guarantee that he or she would be employed on an adjacent scheme, which could also be going through the same problem, or that there would be some other work available and the person will then be back on the scrapheap looking for another position as a supervisor or for something else.

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I acknowledge the work done by the more than 840 community employment schemes nationwide. CE provides vital services to local communities in areas such as the delivery of meals to older people, assisting in childcare provision and environmental work and in keeping towns and villages across the country maintained and looking well.

There are more than 20,000 places available on CE, with a budget of more than €375 million in 2022 and 1,230 people are employed by schemes as supervisors and assistant supervisors. The Department of Social Protection funds CE through the provision of grant funding to sponsor organisations that run schemes. The Department is not the employer of supervisors; they are employees of individual sponsor organisations.

I am, of course, aware of ongoing employment-related issues for CE workers. The first relates to an ex gratiapayment to CE supervisors on their retirement. I am pleased to say this issue has been resolved, with a settlement reached with unions. The first group of ex gratiaapplications are with the Department. These relate to persons who retired since 2008. In total, 630 completed applications have been received. The processing of payments is under way in respect of these claims, with payments starting to issue from this week. I expect all of the first batch to be issued before Christmas.

In relation to pay rates for CE workers, the Department, as the funder of CE schemes, received correspondence earlier this year from Fórsa and SIPTU seeking a pay increase. Fórsa and SIPTU referred this pay claim to the conciliation service of the Workplace Relations Commission. The WRC has issued an invitation to the Department to take part in a conciliation process.

Any increase in pay rates that could potentially increase the overall cost to the State of funding schemes must take into consideration the potential cost to the Exchequer. The Department has been in ongoing contact with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform on this issue, given the potential cost and the knock-on effect it would have on the increased grant funding required to run schemes. Both the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and I fully agree that there must be a process in place to deal with this pay claim. I am aware that the WRC process was used in the past to look at pay claims in the State-funded community and voluntary sector. However, the Department can only participate in this process on the strict understanding that this is in its role as funder of the schemes. We are of the view that the WRC conciliation process could be very useful in identifying a solution to this specific issue.

Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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It is quite clear that the State is trying to hide behind the shadow-employer aspect of the role it plays in the WRC process. The State sets the payscales and benchmarks. No CE scheme is allowed to set the pay scale for a supervisor. Any scheme that increases the funding for a supervisor is punished, as the Department of Social Protection reduces the materials grant available for the scheme. Given the job of a supervisor, it is vital that this job and the job of an assistant supervisor is benchmarked in a different way; one they deserve. Anybody around the country who has enjoyed the services of those who work in CE schemes will attest to that.

Supervisors act as counsellors, psychologists, confidantes, trainers, mentors, managers and administrators. The role is a significant one. There was no recognition of it, but during Covid, meals-on-wheels services continued to operate. The drugs project that I am involved in, Liberty Recycling, empties clothing banks around the country. The participants on the CE scheme were in attendance and were looked after all through Covid. There was no additional recognition for that work. As the Minister of State mentioned, every community benefits from the schemes. The only people who do not seem to benefit from a greater recognition of their role in servicing our communities are supervisors and assistant supervisors. We must be real on this and look at benchmarking them against a higher grade than clerical officers within the Civil Service. My suggestion is to benchmark them against training workshop managers or equivalent because, in many cases, supervisors deal with people who have a lot of issues and they must try to help them back to employment or to complete their years of employment while supporting the community.

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I will take the Deputy's suggestions on board in terms of the variety of tasks required of CE supervisors and assistant supervisors. It is a difficult job.

We are not hiding behind a shadow-employer status. I am very much upfront in saying that the Department of Social Protection is the main funder of CE schemes and, accordingly, we need to respond to the claims of supervisors. In recent weeks and months, I have been very much trying to move things along. I am hopeful that we will make significant progress in the coming weeks. As I stated earlier today in the Chamber in response to a similar question, we need the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to back us now. As a Department, we are willing to go in to the WRC and to make an offer, but we cannot do that without the sanction of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and I very much want to do that. We will keep pushing. We must look after CE supervisors and assistant supervisors, who do amazing work and we should reward them for it.