Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The change is also difficult for some people in Fianna Fáil. In the long run when we look back, I will be happy.

In the beginning when JobBridge was discussed people felt that few people would avail of the scheme. The reality is 22,000 people, most of whom are young people, have availed of the opportunity but the scheme is not confined to young people. The statistics show that about 60% of participants have gone on to secure further significant employment. Let us remember that when the banks collapsed we lost 250,000 jobs in this country. In every recession young people are always affected worse than people in the existing labour market because they are new to employment and lack something vital. They may have excellent education and other qualifications but lack work experience and an employer is likely to prefer a person who has that quality of experience. Today Senators asked many questions about the number of places on the scheme and where the Government will find the additional money.

I am happy to say, as Minister for Social Protection, that when the Irish Presidency arose I prioritised our aim to get a framework for a youth guarantee in the European Union. The initiative had not been tried before and negotiations were difficult and demanding but during the course of the Irish Presidency we succeeded in doing so. I am also happy to say that MEPs from all of the parties in Brussels who are represented in the European Parliament, strongly supported me, including the MEPs from the North, in my attempts to get an agreement on a youth guarantee framework.

Understandably Senators want to know the exact details. I cannot, at this point in time, tell them all of the exact details for the simple reason the youth guarantee will not be finalised at a European level until the Heads of State meeting at the end of December. I shall go to France next week with the Taoiseach to have further discussions on the framework of the youth guarantee. The initiative is not just for Ireland, it is for other European countries even more deeply affected by youth unemployment. However, I shall read out what we have already agreed. As I said, the initiative is very much a work in progress and I want Senators to bear that in mind.

First, we are reducing the threshold in terms of the duration of unemployment eligibility for JobsPlus, from 12 months to six months from 1 January. Employers in Ireland have a critical role to play. I wish to say to people who have contributed to the debate, particularly Senator Heffernan who has taken a detailed interest in the matter, that employers in other countries play a critical role in providing training and education places for young people. A critical issue for young people is to find their first job or work experience. I have sought, across Government, to get social employment clauses into contracts as we invest and re-invest into critical areas of the economy.

From 1 January the JobsPlus scheme will provide €300 per month to an employer who takes on a young person who is more than six months unemployed and on the live register. That is a very significant wage subsidy. It is the kind of thing that is done very successfully to promote the employment of young people in countries like Austria where the rate of youth unemployment is very low. Austria is a small country like Ireland and is the reason I chose it as an example. Employers in Austria have a very strong sense of social responsibility to young people in their society and want to allow them to participate.

We will have an additional intake of 1,500 young people on the JobBridge scheme. Again, I shall ask employers to offer to host those places. There was some conversation here about GAA clubs. I am happy to say that the GAA has been a strong supporter of the JobBridge scheme and given really important opportunities. The FAI has been a very good supporter as well. I was delighted, on a recent visit to FAI headquarters, to meet several people who are graduates of JobBridge and now work in the organisation in full jobs. That is the kind of progress we all must work together to achieve in order to make that possible for our young people.

The Department of Education and Skills is ring-fencing a minimum of 2,000 training places for those aged under 25 in the follow-up to Momentum. That is important because that has been a very successful programme this year for people more than a year unemployed. It provides training in areas where Senators spoke of vacancies in digital skills and IT.

The Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation is making funds available to young entrepreneurs via Microfinance Ireland, MFI, and other business start-up schemes. The total amount involved in that across three Departments is €46 million. The total amount involved within the Department of Social Protection is €14 million. The bulk of the funding for programmes for young people will continue to come from domestic Exchequer resources. Overall, in next year's budget I will be spending an extra €85 million on training and education.

Senators who are concerned about a specific reduction of resources in this particular stream of spending by the Department should know that the spend on the education, the training and the experience budget is doubled, and that is as it should be. Having worked for a long period of my life with young people, I am astonished to hear tones of no faith in young people from a number of the contributors. I know that would not be the case if I were speaking to them privately.

Emigration is heart sore, particularly for the mothers, the fathers and the families of the young people who emigrate but even at the height of the boom in Ireland, there was a significant amount of emigration, which to some extent was people looking for wider experience of the world before coming back to Ireland. I hope that as we rebuild the Irish economy we will draw back the people who left in recent times.

In terms of young people, however, emigration is not the critical factor. The numbers of young people who are unemployed have fallen from 31% to 28%. It is also the case that more young people have been staying in education. Other Senators stated that young qualified people will be going on a relatively low rate of payment but I hope we will find those young graduates who have qualified not going on to any payment but rather going into education and work experience.

The one thing JobBridge has taught me is that we have an astonishing range of incredibly talented young people. They were fortunate in many ways to have been brought up in the Celtic tiger years and their families have supported them in education and so on. They are unfortunate in that they have come out of college with master's and primary degrees, and in some cases a PhD, at a time when their targeted employment was no longer available, perhaps because it was in the public sector. We must put those talents to use and give those young people a chance to become financially independent.

I am happy to say that in the budget the Minister for Education and Skills announced a very significant recruitment campaign for teachers next year and for the first time in a number of years, the Minister for Justice and Equality announced that recruitment to the Garda would recommence. Everybody knows, whether they are talking about their city or their region, that there is not one solution to unemployment that fits everybody. There are probably 100 different solutions, pathways and opportunities, and that is what we are seeking to do.

I will not answer the specific question about actors in detail now because I am not equipped to do so but I will make inquiries with the Department and come back to the Senator. I do not know whether it was in regard to a specific individual or actors in general-----