Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Keogan for raising this issue. I am responding on behalf of the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Humphreys, who could not make it to the debate.

I acknowledge the excellent work that is done on the full range of schemes supported by the Department, including community employment schemes, Tús and the rural social scheme, and the contribution these schemes and their workers make to communities throughout the county. We see in every county, and the Senator and I certainly see it in our county of Meath, high participation across the schemes.

Currently, more than 26,000 participants and 1,635 supervisors are employed on the three main schemes. Overall, these schemes have a budget allocation of €540 million in 2022. Work schemes such as community employment and Tús are positive initiatives that enable the long-term unemployed to make a positive contribution to their communities while upskilling for prospective future employment. The role they play in our communities is well recognised. At present, more than 18,500 places are supported on community employment, with a budget of over €375 million available to support the scheme in 2022.

The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, the Minister of State, Deputy Joe O'Brien, and I announced reforms to the community employment scheme on 21 December 2021 and again on 29 June last. These changes were introduced to improve the operation of the employment support schemes and maintain vital services within our communities. These changes included provision to allow community employment scheme participants who reach 60 years of age to remain on the scheme until they reach State pension age. Reducing the age from 62 to 60 to allow participants to remain on the community employment scheme until they reach State pension age was considered on the basis that this cohort of participants is least likely to progress to employment in the open labour market. It was also part of a type of consultation based on a number of visits by the Minister, the Minister of State and me to the community enterprise offices and community employment offices, engagement with supervisors and managers over a long period as well as many debates in both Houses of the Oireachtas. We have had considerable discussion on this matter in recent years. We all see the value of these schemes to our communities and to people in their 60s who want to stay in schemes and do not want to have to go back into the work environment.

Currently, 27% of community employment scheme participants are between the ages of 60 and 66 and almost half of community employment scheme participants are aged over 55. Community employment was originally only open to participants over the age of 25 until a change was introduced by the Department of Social Protection back in 2017, which reduced the eligible age for participation to where it is today, at 21 years. However, the community employment scheme is already available to those in receipt of disability-related payments and is also available to members of the Traveller and Roma communities, refugees, ex-offenders and inhabitants of offshore islands from the age of 18.

All places on the drugs rehabilitation CE scheme are available to persons aged 18 years or over who are in recovery and referred for a rehabilitation place on a community employment scheme. While the scheme is not open to all customers between the ages of 18 and 21, a wide range of supports in the Department of Social Protection is available to this cohort of young people. It is certainly not the case that there are no supports or that these young people are left to their own devices. These supports include Tús, the work placement experience programme and the JobsPlus scheme, along with a broad range of education and training programmes. I ask any young person in this age cohort to engage directly with the Department of Social Protection and the Intreo offices because a team of caseworkers is ready to work with and assist them on a journey back to work or into a training course or work placement experience programme.

At every business event I attend on behalf of the Department, I stress the importance of giving young people a chance through these schemes and that supports are available to assist the future employee as well as the employer. Strong subsidies are available to both sides to make it worthwhile for everybody to engage with these supports, no matter what age they are, and to follow the pathways to work programme set out in the document.

To give an example, Tús is an employment support scheme, similar to community employment, and, as I mentioned, it is open to those between the ages of 18 and 21. It is worth looking at the participants in that scheme to give some background on research for the lowering of the age on CE schemes. The level of participation on Tús for 18- to 21-year-olds is just over 3% and for 22- to 25-year-olds, it is just over 6%. To be clear, the Senator is asking us to open up schemes for which there does not seem to be great demand because the age group in question avails of the other support schemes, generally the work placement experience programme. The low take-up figures for Tús indicate that such an employment support scheme is not a preferred option for this age group. Coupled with the range of other educational, training and work placements available to this age group, this indicates that extending community employment schemes to all customers in this age group would not make an appreciable difference to participation rates.The live register figures show that 63% of long-term unemployed jobseekers are between the ages of 25 and 54. Community employment placements are an ideal opportunity to provide these older potential participants with relevant work experience and training to help them to move closer to open labour market employment.

Every business owner I talk to tells me he or she cannot find enough people to work in his or her business. There are many jobs on offer and many supports to help people of every age to avail of them, go on training or upskilling programmes or do whatever it takes. We would love to be able to join the dots for everyone, be that person 18, 19, 20 or 21 years of age, through the various supports that are in place. I ask everybody concerned to engage with their caseworkers through the Intreo offices, in addition to the businesses with the gaps.