Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate that and am very grateful to the Acting Chairman. Some may know that I have a job creation initiative that has been running since 2009 in Oranmore. One of the most productive and demanding courses that has come out of that is Momentum. I compliment the Minister on those courses. There is huge interest. In the past few days, I met two people who said that they now have work as a result of that initiative. They got work as a result of the people from the Department of Social Protection who were present there around the Momentum courses. We also bring in employers.

Did the Minister say that she hopes to have 20,000 places next year through the youth guarantee? That worries me. As of July 2013, there are over 20,000 people in Galway on the live register. Almost 10,000 of those are long-term unemployed. With a figure of over 20,000 on the live register, we know that about one third of those are under 30. If there are 7,000 or 8,000 young people in the age cohort in a county like Galway and only 20,000 places are being provided nationally, much more needs to be done. I am not saying that the Minister is not doing her absolute best but the scale of the problem is huge.

We should remember what Professor Pissarides said when he addressed us here. He is a Nobel laureate in economics. He said that we should look at part-time work as well and make sure it is not a disincentive to work.