Lynn Ruane (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 12:

In page 20, line 38, to delete “which is prescribed for the purposes of this section”.

This amendment speaks to the concerns we have outlined with regard to the previous amendment and the proposed new sections 68KG and 68KH. The purpose of this section is to direct recipients of pay-related benefit towards schemes or programmes of employment or work experience as stated in the legislation - even if none of us can decide what work experience is, it is in the legislation - "which is considered appropriate having regard to the education, training and development needs of that person and his or her personal circumstances", as already outlined within the section. There should be no need for the Minister to prescribe additional schemes that may have no regard to the person's education and development needs. This language could potentially result in recipients of the scheme being forced into work experience that is entirely out of step with their experience and needs. It could feasibly lead them to being coercively placed in exploitative employment scenarios and there are no provisions in this Bill that set out that the scheme, programme of employment, or work experience a recipient must participate in are of sufficient quality that it might be of use and benefit to them in the development of their workforce. Senator Ahearn made a good point in the last amendment, where he asked whether a chef would be prescribed to engage in a particular job that he is ordinarily qualified for. You then have to remember that there will be people within this who do not have a qualification as such.We could then end up with, which has been pointed out to me unintentionally, with lower-paid skilled people being sent for work experience rather than the people who are able to articulate themselves at a certain professional level who loses their job. There may be people in a factory who are then told that they have to do a particular work experience and they will be on the lower rate of pay compared to someone who is on a 60% rate of pay. They do not have the same ability then to articulate that they are actually qualified for a particular job so will not take that particular job, because they want to upskill or change direction by way of a transfer to a different sector. We will have people who do not have a professional qualification and they will be even more susceptible to be put into work experience programmes for a lower social welfare payment.