Seanad debates

Tuesday, 21 March 2017

2:30 pm

Photo of Maria ByrneMaria Byrne (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House and thank him for his detailed presentation. There has been much discussion of JobPath, but I will speak from my own experience in terms of the people who come to my office who are long-term unemployed. My experience to date has been with Turas Nua because it operates in the Limerick area. I am aware that many positive changes have been made, certainly in terms of what people experienced in the past. People who were long-term unemployed had a good experience when they went into the social welfare office in the past but they are now allocated a designated officer who works with them for the 12-month period. That is very positive because they are building a relationship with that person whereas in the past they may have met a different person on every occasion.

When the Acting Chairman made his own contribution he referred to the training boards, but my understanding is that once the 12 months are up, people are being encouraged to retrain and upskill. The education and training boards, ETBs, are playing a very important role in terms of that training. There is engagement but there should be more of it. A number of people who are going back to training are now upskilling. They would never have found themselves in that frame of mind previously but they have found it to be a very positive experience.

I read with interest the first quarterly report which has been on the Minister's website since January 2017 and which is so positive. I am getting a positive reaction from people who have been on the JobPath scheme. I also met two people who signed up to the scheme who were subsequently offered full-time jobs in the companies where they worked. They were very positive about the entire training experience and they are also upskilling and training at the same time. In the one-to-one engagement with the person they are dealing with in Turas Nua they are being shown how to present their CVs and deal with issues around confidence and motivation. Many people who were unemployed for a long time were lacking in confidence and motivation, but the fact their mentor, to use that word, is working with them one to one is certainly working.

There has been very little negativity around the scheme. There is a fear that people are not available to take up community employment, CE, schemes, but that is due to the fact our unemployment figure is less than 7%, which is very positive. I am sure that is an issue the Minister is reviewing in the Department in terms of encouraging people to go back into training and take up employment, even if only for the short term. However, not everybody is suited to a CE scheme and some people are not suited to JobPath. I am aware from dealing with people that there are slight differences between the two but people are being assessed for their suitability for the schemes and their skill sets are taken into consideration. There was a fear also around data protection but I understand the data are used only in terms of placing people in their relevant positions.

This has been a positive initiative. There are probably a few areas that need to be addressed in terms of further upskilling and training, but I welcome it in a positive light.

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