Mark Ward (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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32. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the responsibility that her Department has in making changes to the Community Employment Procedures Manual; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [50729/22]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy is aware Community Employment (CE) is an active labour market programme designed to provide eligible long-term unemployed people and other disadvantaged persons with an opportunity to engage in useful work within their communities on a temporary, fixed term basis.

The programme is delivered through independent CE sponsor organisations who are the legal employers of their CE supervisors, CE assistant supervisors and CE participants. CE sponsor organisations receive state funding to cover the cost of remuneration, training and material costs from the department.

The CE Procedures Manual is produced by the Department of Social Protection to assist Departmental officials and CE sponsor organisations to manage CE, to ensure consistent and proper governance of considerable state investment in CE. My department is responsible for changing and updating the Procedures Manual on a rolling basis. It is worth noting that changes are often not made to the Procedures Manual immediately as they occur. Given the ever-changing landscape of CE, it is not feasible to amend the Procedures Manual for every change, hence it is done periodically. The most recent version of the manual was published in April 2022.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.