Jillian van Turnhout (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank my colleague, Senator Marie-Louise O'Donnell, who has done considerable work on this issue and produced a report that I recommend the Minister of State and the Minister for Social Protection read, as a number of proposals are worthy of consideration. I will not repeat previous interventions I have made on the Youth Guarantee but will instead ask a series of questions because I want to further the issue and there are issues on which I have not received answers.

On the last occasion the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Burton, was with us, on 5 February, she stated that the implementation of the Youth Guarantee could not be achieved with the flick of a switch. All of us agreed with that at the time but I spoke about the importance of the national partner organisations named in the Youth Guarantee plan published in January. On 5 February I indicated they had not heard anything from the Department; having contacted them on foot of this debate they have told me they still have not really heard anything from the Department. Partnership is crucial in delivering this plan and partners must be kept in the loop. The Department of Social Protection held a stakeholder forum last October when devising the plan and perhaps it would be useful to have another stakeholder forum to update and involve partners, and I ask the Minister of State if there are any plans to have this type of forum.

There is also a concern that this is initially a two-year programme, and we all hope it will continue beyond 2015. It is very important that we spend the financial envelope allocated for 2014 and 2015, so will the Minister of State provide an update and assure the House that the moneys allocated to Ireland will be spent? I know that seems to be an obvious question but I am not convinced at this time.

One of the more disappointing aspects was raised by me before the plan's publication and again in February. It is the failure to acknowledge the role and value of engaging the youth work sector in supporting the participation of young people in the Youth Guarantee programme. Will that be reviewed in light of the experience to date in Ballymun? I know the Minister for Social Protection met Commissioner Andor at Ballymun Regional Youth Resources last week to find out its experience of supporting the implementation of the Ballymun Youth Guarantee project. I am sure the Minister of State is aware that there has been work with the Department of Social Protection and the Ballymun Job Centre in reducing the number of what are referred to as "DNA" or "do not attends". This is the scenario where a young person receives a letter inviting attendance at an interview or a group engagement with the Department of Social Protection but does not attend. I welcome the fact that in Ballymun, the Department worked with the Ballymun Regional Youth Resources to find out why this happens and support young people in participation. The feedback from young people is that letters did not arrive on time or were sent to the wrong addresses. Some young people did not understand their content or had literacy problems and could not read the letters. I know the Department of Social Protection has changed its process in response to the feedback from young people, altering the nature of communications. This is a perfect example of why youth work organisations need to be involved, so they can reach out and meet young people who can be hard to contact.

Ballymun Regional Youth Resources has also been working with young people to support and encourage them to engage in the process and understand why it is important while providing some moral support to young people who are not used to engaging with State agencies or who have had a bad experience in the past. This is very welcome but the reality is there is no provision or funding in the national plan to facilitate this type of work in the rest of the country. Will the national plan be revised to reflect the experience of youth engagement in Ballymun?

Like the Minister I welcome increased employment in our country but at a recent conference the Central Bank reported that 90% of new jobs created in 2013 were for people with third level qualifications. This is good news for the many well-educated and qualified graduates in our country but I am concerned about the uneven recovery, with young people with limited qualifications left behind. The Youth Guarantee plan proposes, correctly, to begin with the 22,000 long-term unemployed young people but what will the Government do to ensure we have job opportunities for these young people when they complete their Youth Guarantee programme? The Government recently published Construction 2020 and although that will make a contribution, we should never go back to where we were in the early 2000s, relying on the construction industry to provide jobs for these young people. What else is being done, as this sector should not be seen as the only solution?

At a meeting of the education committee earlier this afternoon, the Minister for Social Protection confirmed that the JobBridge scheme for disadvantaged youths, which will be called Developmental JobBridge and was proposed in the national Youth Guarantee plan, will be mandatory for those identified as eligible. I welcome greater targeting of the disadvantaged but I am very concerned at hearing that JobBridge will be compulsory for some groups. Rather than forcing people to participate in JobBridge internship, which may at best be unhelpful and at worst could be damaging and exploitative, I recommend the Department to engage in consultation to ascertain why some groups of young people are more attracted to other training and education programmes. I have heard anecdotally that the extra €50 in some cases has an impact on other entitlements such as rent allowances, meaning that JobBridge participants could end up worse off. I do not know for sure if that is true but those questions must be answered. The Department of Social Protection must consider how to remove barriers to encourage participation rather than forcing people to participate in a programme.

Will the Minister of State outline the number of case workers now in place to engage with young people about the Youth Guarantee? It is vital to have sufficient numbers of case workers in place to deliver on personal progression plans. When will the Youth Guarantee formally commence?