Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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My Department currently provides employment services for people with disabilities through 23 EmployAbility contracted service providers across the State. Up to now all contracts for the EmployAbility Service were issued for a single 12 month period and rolled-over on an annual basis.

My officials are undertaking a procurement process to update current EmployAbility services in order to comply with legal advice from the Attorney General and Chief State Solicitor’s Office relating to national and EU legislative procurement provisions.

It is not the intention of this procurement to significantly change the services currently provided to clients, reflecting the overall effectiveness of the current service.

Stakeholder engagement has been a key aspect of this procurement process with my officials having met with each EmployAbility service provider individually. In addition, in May, I met with the Chairs of all EmployAbility companies in order to hear their views on the forthcoming process.

The Request for Tender (RFT), which issued in September with a closing date of 20th November, was drafted having regard to feedback received from these stakeholder engagements.

The proposed new EmployAbility model aims to enhance the autonomy of the service providers to enable them to more effectively provide a high-quality supported employment service for people with disabilities. It is in everyone’s interests that my Department continues to support a quality employment service for people with disabilities and my officials will continue to work with all stakeholders on the best way to achieve this while ensuring contracts are legally compliant.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.