Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 461 to 463, inclusive, together.

The Vocational Training and Opportunities Scheme (VTOS) is designed to cater for people who are over 21 years of age, are unemployed and have been getting certain social welfare payments for at least 6 months. This scheme provides a range of courses to meet the education and training needs of unemployed people. It gives participants opportunities to improve their general level of education, gain certification, develop their skills and prepare for employment, self-employment and further education and training. The scheme is operated through local Education and Training Boards (ETBs) and is aimed in particular at unemployed people who are early school-leavers.

The Programme and Learner Support System (PLSS) manages the application process for FET provision. While there are no waiting lists by ETB within PLSS, it is possible to identify the number of learners who are waiting to hear if they have been accepted onto a VTOS course.When an applicant registers their interest in an FET course, either online or manually, their application is recorded as received on the system. Subsequently as the application is scrutinised the status moves to “being processed”. An analysis of PLSS indicates that there are 537 individuals who have one of these two statuses and are waiting to hear if they have been accepted onto a VTOS course that will start later in 2021 when the 2021/22 academic year begins. It is important to note that the status of these individuals is not an indication of the existence of capacity issues.

It is not possible to estimate the cost to the state of removing the eligibility criteria that participants must have been unemployed for six months prior to starting a VTOS course as no information is held in relation to how many of this cohort would take up a VTOS course if they were eligible. However, it is important to stress that the existence of the six month rule is not driven by budgetary considerations, but rather by the policy imperative to tailor provision to the needs of the target cohort.

Participants on VTOS receive a training allowance in lieu of their Social Welfare payment as well as travel and meal allowances.VTOS course content, ranging from basic education and training to advanced vocational training, is aimed at individuals who are considered to need significant interventions, to increase their employability. Accordingly, eligibility is restricted to individuals who have been unemployed for at least 6 months for this reason.A suite of alternative FET provision is available to cater for individuals who are more recently unemployed, i.e., less than six months. This includes Post Leaving Certificate (PLC) options and a range of training initiatives.

The number of VTOS Core Learner enrolments per ETB for 2020 is in the following table.