John Paul Phelan (Fine Gael)

I was thinking of times past.

Fine Gael will support the Labour Services (Amendment) Bill on Second Stage but will have a number of amendments to table on Committee Stage. I agree with many of the Minister of State's opening comments on the role of FÁS. It is much maligned in the light of the difficulties that emerged at the top level of the organisation in the past 12 months, in particular. However, good work is done on the ground in training apprentices, retraining and upskilling people for the workforce and in local employment schemes. One of the first debates in which I participated in the Chamber seven years ago was on the importance of the community employment aspect of FÁS. Often that work goes unheralded and is not noted.

The Bill does not go far enough in terms of a root and branch review of FÁS and a full discussion of what we want our national training agency to do. A considerable body of opinion, with which I concur, holds that we ask too much of FÁS, that its fingers are in too many pies and that it should be broken up into a number of smaller and more manageable agencies which would be specifically targeted at delivering in the areas with which they would be concerned.

I was interested in the Minister of State's final comments on the Government's objective to keep FÁS at the centre of our fight to improve the position of the country's labour market. The public no longer has confidence in FÁS as an organisation. That is not due to any lack of effort on the part of employees and trainers; it is because of the actions of executives and board members over a sustained period of years. The Bill is a missed opportunity to reform the way we deliver training programmes.

I was also interested to hear the Minister of State insert the words "in future" when referring to the board of FÁS comprising members with the necessary expertise and competencies. In other words, like many of us, the Minister of State acknowledges that in the past perhaps many of the board members did not have the necessary expertise and competencies to be able to fulfil their roles correctly.

The Bill's chief component is a reduction in the number of board members. I welcome these provisions as the old board was an unwieldy body. I also welcome the protections included in the Bill for whistleblowers. I share the view that the Government needs to introduce general legislation on whistleblowing to ensure the positions of people throughout the public service would be secure if they were in a position to declare that something untoward was occurring. While this is what should happen, I welcome the protections contained in the Bill.

I welcome the provision on the accountability of the director general before the Committee of Public Accounts and other Oireachtas committees. The Bill correctly seeks to provide the Minister with the power to remove board members who underperform in their functions. However, it is worth remembering that most of what we saw uncovered in FÁS in the past 18 months concerned the actions of the top executives rather than those of board members, although no doubt they were somewhat responsible in their lack of oversight of what was happening beneath them in the structure of the organisation. The provision should be extended to put the Minister in a position where they can remove leading executives from their positions for underperformance.

I refer to the fact that many Members of both Houses, including Senator Ross and Deputy Varadkar, highlighted what had gone on in FÁS over a period of time. For ten years we had virtually full employment and spent €1 billion per annum on the State training agency. We now know that much of that money was misused. That is why it is essential to have a new training agency and we should remove some local employment scheme functions and place them in their natural home in local government. There is even an argument to be made that responsibility for some apprenticeship schemes should be removed and given to the Department of Education and Science or an agency under its aegis. The organisation is unwieldy and a strong case can be made for various agencies taking its powers and being specifically targeted to deliver results in the areas with which they are concerned.

Will the Minister of State comment on the media reports that followed the tabling of a parliamentary question by Deputy Lee on senior management remuneration and the increase in the number of senior managers in FÁS from 170 to 290 in an 11 year period?

The reply to the parliamentary question also revealed that the total pay bill for these managers increased by 77% and an average remuneration of €80,000. In 1997, FÁS employed 11 staff for every manager but that figure had decreased to seven by 2009.

During the boom years, the Government took its eye off the ball in terms of overseeing FÁS. A number of high profile politicians, including the Tánaiste, have held the position of Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment. It is a difficult job and much like the current Minister for Finance, many of the problems which the Tánaiste is trying to address are not of her making. However, during her term in that role, the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, doubled the number of directors from 15 to 30 and flew in the face of all that she has preached in her political career regarding reducing management staff in State bodies.

Perhaps the Minister of State will indicate whether an examination is being conducted of the Labour Services Act 1987 with a view to creating a new group of training agencies. FÁS is trying to do everything from social employment to fourth level education but that is an unsustainable model for the future.

The employment programmes and community employment schemes run by FÁS cost approximately €430 million per annum. While much of the work done through these programmes is valuable, their proper home is in local government. Despite the recommendations of the McCarthy report, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Gormley, continues to advocate an extension to the powers of local government and most Members of this House have served on local authorities. This is an area over which local authorities should be given control because most of the work done through these programmes is at the local level.

The budget for corporate services and regional directorates costs FÁS €150 million per annum. Particularly in the current economic environment, we must ask whether we are getting value for that money. In light of what we have learned over the past 18 months, I suggest that we are not getting value for our money. The corporate and regional directorate budget is 50% greater than the €100 million spent annually on apprenticeships, an area in which FÁS is internationally recognised as having excelled.

We need to examine closely the €1 billion we provide to FÁS annually. Given that more than 400,000 people are signing on the live register, it has never been more important that we find new employment and upskilling opportunities. The timing of the revelations about the agency are particularly disappointing for that reason. Arguably, we did not need to spend anything approaching €1 billion during the good times but that money is now needed to provide real opportunities to those who find themselves on the live register.

While I have reservations about the Bill's failure to go far enough in examining the role and multiple functions of FÁS, any legislation which would reform the board of the agency and the spending of public moneys must be welcomed. I will be supporting the Bill on Second Stage, therefore.