Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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717. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he is pursuing any strategy to ring fence funding to attract skilled workers back from abroad to fill the shortfall in skills needed to meet the housing demand; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [67933/25]

Marian Harkin (Sligo-Leitrim, Independent)
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Ireland needs more construction workers to help meet targets contained in the national housing plan Delivering Homes, Building Communities and infrastructural priorities in the National Development Plan.

Research undertaken by my Department found a lack of knowledge and understanding about the industry and the roles available, a poor perception of the working environment as well as a perception that construction is not suitable for women. In response, the Department is implementing the Careers in Construction Action Plan, which comprises 20 actions that relate to structural, promotional, and training activities to minimise barriers, promote career opportunities, and make construction jobs more attractive to women.

Among the actions are several campaign initiatives supported by the 2024 and 2025 Housing for All Implementation Fund. These include the Building Heroes peer-to-peer social media campaign, a documentary on careers in construction for second-level schools, and the Build Back Home campaign focused on Irish construction workers abroad.

It is well known that there are many opportunities for Irish construction workers who have moved abroad and are considering returning. The Updated Report on the Analysis of Skills for Residential Construction & Retrofitting estimates that Ireland needs between 69,000 - 79,000 additional construction workers to help deliver on residential targets alone. The National Development Plan outlines a record €275.4 billion in public capital investment, aiming to secure Ireland's future, to transform the country, unlock housing, upgrade water and energy infrastructure, deliver more roads, and provide better public transport.

However, research shows that many Irish currently abroad believe that the skills they developed may not be valued at home.

In response, my Department developed the Build Back Home campaign in 2024 to address this misconception by reassuring these workers that their skills are needed and welcomed and providing links to websites offering further information. This targeted international social media campaign, which utilised a mix of social media, digital audio, and digital out-of-home (OOH) advertising, focused on Irish diaspora communities in Australia and Canada, two countries with large populations of skilled Irish workers.

The campaign spend in 2024 was €167,000 and to date €277,000 from the 2025 Housing for All Implementation Fund has be allocated to this year’s campaign, which has evolved to feature testimonials from construction workers sharing their positive experiences of moving back home.

The latest data shows strong engagement with the current campaign, with more than 2 million views via social media. The campaign’s landing page on gov.ie has had more than 68,750 visits, 95% of which are from North America, Canada and Australia.

Under the 2026 National Housing Plan Implementation Fund €100,000 has been allocated towards the Build Back Home campaign and I am pleased to confirm that the campaign will form an important part of an updated Careers in Construction Action Plan, which is due to be published in the new year.

While definitive causal effects cannot be concluded, the range of actions undertaken through the Careers in Construction Action Plan will have had a contributory effect on the following key metrics:

• 18% increase in the construction workforce year on year (from 160,700 in Q2 2024 to 190,300 in Q2 2025).
• 52% increase in women in construction (from 11,400 in Q4 2023 to 17,300 in Q1 2025).
• 22% increase in first preference CAO choices for engineering and construction courses in 2025.
• 12% increase in construction and construction related apprenticeship registrations (from 5,628 in 2022 to 6,319 in 2024).
• 13% increase in craft apprenticeship registrations (from 6,299 in 2022 to 7,113 in 2024).