Rebecca Moynihan (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I often say when I rise to speak after a Sinn Féin Senator that I have the same issue to raise. I will also raise the local employment service because the issue is affecting the whole country and there is a time-sensitivity to it. I understand that local employment services have received an extension to their current contracts until the new year, but after the new year they are unsure where they will be. The Department of Social Protection has said to them that salary costs are too high. It seems extraordinary to me that the Department of Social Protection is saying that having decent, well-paid jobs is problematic for it. Essentially, the Department is trying to replace what is a community and individual-driven model of trying to place people in local employment with a commercial tendering model. There are certain causes of this. It will be a pay-per-placement, commercial, cost-driven model for people on the register. People coming into local employment services may have lost confidence, may have lost a job, may not have been in the workplace for a long time and may have been a carer. They will suddenly be told they have to go into inappropriate jobs for which they might not be ready or able for because the Department of Social Protection has decided to replace the current model with a commercial tendering model. One of the key parts of this is that the services are not allowed to take walk-ins. Rather than the people using the services and the staff, the services will be driven by key performance indicators, KPIs, and a bureaucrat looking at a number of indicators and ticking off boxes. That does not recognise the huge contribution local employment services have given this country over the years or the humanity of people using them. Therefore, preferably before Christmas, we need a debate on the local employment services. The issue is affecting my area particularly but other areas around the country as well.

I also wish to raise the evolving humanitarian crisis on the EU Polish-Belarusian border. It is shocking to see, in 2021, scenes from an EU member state of water-cannoning, and in some cases there are reports of tear-gassing of refugees who are trying legitimately to claim asylum from the Middle East. There is a shrugging of shoulders and comment to the effect that this is an act on the part of Belarus and of Lukashenko, who is trying to get at the EU. I do not care what Lukashenko's reasons or rationale for doing this are but I do care about the thousands of migrants on the border. Fortress Europe is not only turning them away but in many cases, it seems, violently doing so. The Polish Government has refused to engage with Frontex, the EU border agency. We need to have a debate about this here because in 2021 the way in which the European Union is treating people claiming legitimate asylum coming from the European border is an absolute disgrace. It will be a shame and a stain on us if we allow Poland to continue doing this.