Lucinda Creighton (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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Question 212: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Education and Skills the number of the 6589 training places that have been filled under the labour market activation fund 2010; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [36527/10]

Seán Haughey (Dublin North Central, Fianna Fail)
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Following an open tender competition in which 370 tenders were received, I announced in June details of the first call of the Labour Market Activation Fund to support 26 different organisations across the private, not-for-profit and public sectors. This has resulted in 6,589 additional training and education places in programmes for priority groups of the unemployed.

Overall indications of interest and applications from would-be programme participants to date confirm the popularity of courses on offer. I am therefore reassured of the success of this initiative as a whole. A number of programmes from the first call of the Fund are still in the process of recruiting participants and it is expected that these programmes will be up and running before the end of the year. Until all programmes are up and running it is extremely difficult to assess accurately the exact number of places that have been filled.