Dinny McGinley (Donegal South West, Fine Gael)
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Question 64: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment her views on reducing the number of work permits and work visas issued by her Department in view of the increase in unemployment; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [7363/09]

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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Since 2004, Irish labour market policy has been to ensure that general labour and skills needs are met from within the workforce of the European Union. For strategic skills or labour shortages in designated occupations in key economic sectors, Government policy is to issue employment permits for the employment of non-EEA nationals for specific vacancies and in response to employer demand. These key economic sectors include healthcare, information technology and financial services. The various schemes that give effect to such policies were introduced under the Employment Permits Act, 2006.

Currently employment permit holders constitute approximately 1.5% of the total labour force. Given that our current employment permit arrangements were designed to be vacancy-driven, the numbers of permit applications and consequent numbers of permits issued over the last six months have been showing a consistent downward trend. Our employment permit arrangements are currently being reviewed to ensure their ongoing relevance to the needs of the Irish labour market.