Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

If we have a system that makes such practices nearly impossible, we can be almost sure they will not be followed. Assisting people to get back to work and return to education in order that they will not sit on jobseeker's payments is very important to me. All of the medical and sociological evidence indicates that unemployment is very bad for people, for whom it is not a natural state. In the budget we announced the creation of 15,000 places; the constraint is not money but rather that it takes time for such processes to be put in place. This morning I met people who were interested in getting the unemployed onto schemes in a hurry. They made an interesting point which confirmed my experience. They said it could not be done in a hurry because a result of the requirement to seek Garda clearance and to engage in selection processes, etc. we would be talking about a period of three or four months to get people into position. I fully recognise this, but if we start today rather than in a month's time, we will get there one month earlier. Howver, it will still take time. When we came up with the figure of 15,000, it was not considered small; we wanted to be realistic about what would be achievable in a period of one year. Community groups will identify jobs and there are other processes required to be followed to get people into jobs. This takes time. I stress that it is wrong to have people engaged in mindless work. It should be meaningful for the participant, host and community to ensure we get something practical out of it.

There are 22,000 participants in community employment schemes, with 5,000 participating in the rural social scheme and the community services programme. There are 23,000 in receipt of the back to education allowance, which brings the total close to 50,000 people. There are approximately 10,000 participating in work activation schemes, bringing the total to 60,000 and there are the 15,000 places announced to be added. There are also training schemes.