Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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JobPath is a new service to support jobseekers whereby the Department of Social Protection has procured additional resources, under contract, to enable it provide a high quality case managed employment support service to people who are long term unemployed. JobPath supplements the internal case management capacity of the Department’s Intreo service and the Local Employment Service. Over the past year this additional capacity has enabled the Department to provide an intensive employment support and advisory service to over 60,000 long term unemployed jobseekers who would otherwise not have received such a service. The JobPath service is provided by two companies, Seetec and Turas Nua, who have put in place a network of over 80 offices nationwide and who employ nearly 600 staff of whom some 400 are caseworkers. The JobPath companies will continue to engage with long-term unemployed jobseekers in 2017.

My Department’s online job vacancy service www.jobsireland.ie enables employers and jobseekers to search for prospective employees and jobs using skillsets and competencies as well as the traditional job type classifications. Jobseekers can also search jobs by location. Once a jobseeker is registered, the service automatically matches candidates to job specifications and can notify both the jobseeker and the employer when a match is found.

During 2017, all jobseekers will be required to register on www.jobsireland.ie. It is planned to integrate JobsIreland with my Department’s Activation Case-Management system to enable activation teams to offer enhanced supports to jobseekers and monitor their job search activity.

My Department has progressively rolled out its Intreo service to people with disabilities who wish to avail of the service on a voluntary basis. People with disabilities who present at INTREO Centres will be offered an interview by a case officer who will agree a personal plan with the individual. Officers in INTREO Centres have received additional training to assist them in supporting people with disabilities.

My Department will spend more than €1 billion in 2016 on work, training and education places in support of jobseekers. Expenditure and the number of schemes and participants increased significantly in recent years in a response to the high levels of unemployment which peaked at 15%.

Schemes such as Community Employment (CE), Tús and RSS play an important role in helping jobseekers maintain work skills. Erosion of jobseeker confidence and work skills, including soft skills related to team-working, communication, planning etc., is a significant issue over long periods of unemployment.

With the ongoing welcome reductions in the Live Register, issues such as the appropriate level of expenditure, the number of places and the criteria for participation on employment schemes are all being considered. I hope to be in a position to bring a Memorandum to Government on these matters in the coming weeks. If there are any changes to be made, consultations with stakeholders will be facilitated.

Finally, with regard to rural communities, the Farm Assist scheme provides support for farmers on low incomes and is similar to Jobseeker’s Allowance. As part of Budget 2017, farm income and other income from off-farm self-employment is to be assessed at 70%, down from 100%, for Farm Assist, with additional annual disregard of €254 for each of the first two children and €381 for the third and other children. There is also a €5 increase in maximum weekly rate of Farm Assist and €3.30 increase for adult dependants. Invalidity Pension is being extended to the self-employed including farmers. In addition entitlement to Dental and Optical Benefits is also being extended to this cohort. It is also worth noting that 500 additional places under the Rural Social Scheme were announced which will increase the overall number to 3,100. My Department intends allocating these places as early as possible in 2017 taking into account a number of factors. These include the number of places already allocated, the demand for new places in particular areas, work opportunities available in local areas and the numbers of farmers and fishermen and women in receipt of income support. In allocating the additional places, the Government recognises the benefits the RSS provides for participants and their families, as well as the valuable contribution the scheme is making to the provision of services in communities across Ireland.