Written answers

Tuesday, 1 July 2014

Department of Social Protection

Youth Guarantee

Photo of Derek NolanDerek Nolan (Galway West, Labour)
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230. To ask the Minister for Social Protection if she will engage with voluntary youth organisations in the roll-out of the Youth Guarantee; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [28057/14]

Photo of Joan BurtonJoan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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In order to develop and implement a Youth Guarantee Plan, the Department of Social Protection set up an interdepartmental Youth Guarantee Implementation Group with officials and programme managers from the Department of Education and Skills, the Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs. The terms of reference for this group were to review the current range of youth employment services in Ireland, to assess what measures are appropriate to deliver the Youth Guarantee in Ireland and to develop the implementation plan for approval of Government and transmission to the EU.

In addition, in order to get non-governmental input into the Youth Guarantee implementation plan the Department of Social Protection held a YG stakeholders’ consultation forum in October. The DSP invited further submissions from the bodies that attended.

A number of submissions were received, including submissions from The National Youth Council of Ireland, Spunout.ie, Youthwork Ireland, Tipperary Regional Youth Service, Wexford Youth Action and the YMCA. These submissions will be taken into consideration during the rollout of the Youth Guarantee Process.

In addition the Department retained the OECD to provide input and advice on the framing of the plan (the OECD is also providing assistance to a number of other countries). As part of this process a delegation from the OECD met with stakeholders at the aforementioned forum as well as with a range of relevant public bodies. Ultimately stakeholder feedback via the forum, submissions and bilateral meetings with the OECD has fed into the design of the national YG implementation plan.

The Youth Guarantee Implementation plan specifically states that the National Youth Council of Ireland (NYCI) along with other national partners will be invited to participate in the delivery and/or review of the Youth Guarantee.

The Ballymun Pilot Youth Guarantee scheme has strong involvement from the voluntary youth sector in its implementation. The youth sector is represented on the both the National Steering Group (National Youth Council of Ireland) and the Local Implementation Group (Ballymun Regional Youth Resource). The lessons learned from this pilot will feed into the national rollout of the Guarantee.

As the Guarantee is rolled out, the specific local arrangements for involvement of partners, including youth organisations will be a matter for divisional and regional management in the Department of social Protection. In particular, where there are indications that any significant groups of young people will not be reached by the PES (Intreo office), alternative ways of reaching these young people through Youth Work approaches will be explored.

Photo of Ann PhelanAnn Phelan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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231. To ask the Minister for Social Protection following the successful introduction of the pilot project in Ballymun of the Youth Guarantee scheme, if there is a timeline in place to establish such a scheme in a rural constituency; the supports that will be put in place to enable young persons to access these schemes; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [28061/14]

Photo of Joan BurtonJoan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The Youth Guarantee will be run on a national basis. The Ballymun Pilot is being mainly funded by the European Commission. Such specific funding for other pilot programmes is not available. Moreover, it is unlikely that the Department will operate a specific scheme for each of its 60+ local offices. However there will be flexibility to tailor the implementation to local conditions (for example with regard to the cohorts of young people to be selected for engagement in the first instance etc.) and the specific approach to be followed in each area, be it rural or local, will be a matter for local DSP management in consultation with relevant stakeholders. It is intended that the approach in other areas will however benefit from the lessons learned during the Ballymun pilot. In particular, it is intended, that local employment initiatives will be driven by local employer groups, local DSP/Intreo staff, local community groups and local training providers working collaboratively, as in Ballymun, to tailor the approach to their local circumstances.

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