Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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Question 19: To ask the Minister for Social Protection the way the rights and responsibilities contract will be enforced; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [11742/12]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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As part of the implementation of the Pathways to Work approach it is intended that every client applying for a jobseekers payment will be asked to sign-up to a social contract with the Department. The social contract is being finalised at the moment and will be introduced in our trial offices in May. It is intended to be a straightforward document that sets out the services that will be provided by the Department and the commitment that will be expected from clients to engage with and work with these services. It is nothing more nor less than that but it is an important initiative in terms of

· the Department committing to a standard of service delivery against which it can be evaluated by customers

· making the terms of the service explicit to customers so that they know that these services don't come for free – that they will be expected to invest their time and effort to make the most of the services on offer

Basically, there is a right to a payment but also a matching responsibility on the unemployed person to engage with the system. This, I think, is a reasonable approach from the individual's and the taxpayer's perspective.

The contract will clearly specify that failure of the client to honour their commitments may result in the reduction or suspension of their welfare payment. In this regard reduced payment rates were provided for in the Social Welfare Act 2010.

The reduced rates, which apply to personal jobseekers payments, may be implemented where a jobseeker:

(i) refuses an appropriate offer of training by an officer of the Department;

(ii) refuses, or declines to avail of, an offer of training;

(iii) declines an intervention – for example a referral to a work experience programme or a specific work opportunity;

(iv) does not attend scheduled meetings with an officer of the Department;

The relevant legislation provides safeguards for the social welfare recipient in terms of the reasonableness of the intervention being offered. In common with many social welfare provisions, the new measures allow for discretion on the part of a deciding officer, as an offer of training, education or employment must be viewed in the context of a person's circumstances. Where a customer has been subject to the reduced rate, the normal rate of payment will be restored from a current date when the person subsequently engages with the process or takes up offers of training that were made.

Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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Question 20: To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she took cognisance of the European vacancy monitor published by the European Commission in January 2012 which demonstrated that there are 50 jobseekers for every single vacancy here when she was developing Pathways to Work. [11879/12]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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My Department undertook a significant range of work in preparing the Pathways to Work policy and in the development of a new National Employment and Entitlements Service, as provided for in the Programme for Government, which will integrate employment and benefit payment services within the Department. With reference to the European vacancy monitor the Deputy mentioned I believe the data used for the January 2012 report is the estimated number of vacancies at the end of the second quarter 2011, compared to the number of unemployed people. This figure does not represent the number of jobs actually filled over time. The same report, for example, estimates the number of jobs filled at approximately 95,000 during the quarter in question. As I am sure the Deputy noted from the report, there has been an increase in the number of jobs compared to the previous year.

My concern is in particular for people who become long term unemployed as data from my own Department indicates that while a person has a 50% chance of finding work in their first year of unemployment, this figure drops to 10% in the second year and continues to drop every year thereafter. Pathways to Work is designed to address this pattern by working with people to help them enhance their job prospects and secure one of the available vacancies.

It is also important to note that the Pathways to Work policy is not a policy working in isolation from other actions. The Government launched its Action Plan for Jobs with a view to creating a net additional 100,000 jobs over the next five years. Pathways to Work is a complementary policy designed to support people currently on the live register to access those jobs.