Mary Ann O'Brien (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister. As I had not planned to speak, I will be brief.

I welcome the positive update and no matter how small the growth rate is, we are moving in the right direction. I feel very positive and feel like cheering. We can only move in one direction and I am delighted. I know it is small, but I welcome it. I also welcome the Minister's efforts to ensure work pays. This is a huge problem. The Minister deals with very sensitive issues, but reform of housing supports and simplification of other payments are very much welcome.

I wish to put a number of ideas to the Minister. I would like to see the awareness of employers raised. I am lucky to be here because when I attend management meetings, I am aware of schemes such as JobsPlus, but I have many friends in the food business who simply do not seem to know about them. We have the media and agencies, but would it be possible to use a little funding to raise awareness? The JobsPlus scheme is a gift from heaven for an employer. It is welcome that the Minister is increasing the number of caseworkers. Does she believe caseworkers have received enough training and upskilling? Are they motivated enough and have we injected them with enough passion to help people? Most people have been unemployed for several months at some stage. I was only 19, but I remember being such a depressed Dan at home with my parents because I thought I would never get out. We all have friends who are unemployed and know how demotivating it is. The caseworkers need to be on top of their game. I am beginning to sound like someone from the United States, but as we are putting employers on related bonuses for employing people, would it be possible to have caseworkers in performance related bonus schemes?

I love heritage and old Ireland and would like to see the dots being joined between the areas of tourism, education and social protection. The heritage budget was cut from €22 million to €7 million. We are in serious times and cannot cut for the less well-off and the heritage budget is easy to cut, but we are spending a fortune on tourism and have lost a lot of income through cutting the VAT rate. However, if we stop our work in the heritage sector, what will be there for tourists when they come? Heritage is all about communities and when work is done on an old building, it is usually people involved in construction or creative individuals who are involved. We are putting the country back together and making beautiful old things safer and better. We allow beautiful old buildings to be restored for tourists to see and the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Leo Varadkar, is as happy as the tourists. Community self-esteem also increases. I, therefore, ask all Departments to please join the dots and help the Minister in this regard. I call for the heritage budget to be increased because it will help to create jobs in an area in which we do not have to upskill people. We have many brilliant individuals such as stonemasons and those involved in construction. England seems to have beautiful thatched cottages in abundance, but ours are disappearing before our eyes. All anybody from the United States who comes to Ireland wants to see is a thatched cottage.

I was very touched by what the Minister stated about children in families where people had been unemployed for generations. The Minister for Education and Skills will come to the House tomorrow. It is very important that we keep motivating and injecting passion in these children who are so unlucky to be living in such houses because it is hard for parents to be good role models. I feel so elitist in saying this, but the dots must be joined.