Before Question Time I mentioned in my contribution that the Minister should accept any criticism as constructive. I have no doubt, knowing the Minister, that that will be the position. I want to touch on a few——
National Employment and Training Authority Bill, 1986: Second Stage (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time".
On a point of order, I have difficulty in hearing the Deputy.
I want to point out a few of the anomalies which I see. An injustice is being done to our young people. For instance, if you take a young boy or girl who is doing a course with AnCO, especially an apprenticeship course, they are trained for about one and a half years. They are then asked to leave and to go out and try to find somebody who will sponsor them to complete their period of apprenticeship. We are doing a terrible injustice to young people in this service. I have known many young boys and girls who have gone through a period of one and a half years training and who then applied for a job. They left the interview for that job being told that they were half baked apprentices. It is morally wrong that we should be training our young people for that kind of future. If they are admitted to an AnCO course, they should be allowed complete the full period of apprenticeship.
About 12 months go I put down questions in this House to three different Departments, Social Welfare, Labour and the Public Service, in the hope that I would get some information or that some record would be kept of those unfortunate young people who are considered half backed apprentices. This is an appalling state of affairs and is a terrible injustice to inflict on our young people. I ask the Minister to give very serious consideration to this aspect of apprenticeship training with AnCO.
I am at a loss to understand why there is so much duplication of functions between AnCO and Manpower. A young person is first interviewed by Manpower, then sent to AnCO to do a course where they undergo another interview. There must be some way of stopping this type of duplication. It is like a young person applying twice for one job. AnCO, or Manpower, should be the body to carry out the interview and to make the assessment. These are the areas to which we will have to give very serious consideration because this kind of duplication is costing the State a great deal of money.
It is sad that a young boy or girl who is not prepared to continue education after primary level does not have any knowledge of the services which are available to them. Rather, they come on to the streets and are misinformed about the services that are available. If appropriate leaflets or booklets were distributed in the schools at that stage, they would be of great benefit in helping the young people to decide what kind of career is available to them. I believe the disadvantaged youth should receive particular attention, especially those coming from disadvantaged areas. If one visits these areas and discusses the position with people who are voluntarily giving their time and effort to the community associations, what do they say? They tell us nobody is taking an interest in those people. We should be placing all our emphasis on those people. We should help them, encourage them, and impress upon them that they have a future and that they should be guided by the many services we are setting up to help them.
I know the Minister is dedicated to helping these people and that is why I hope that any criticism I make today will be of benefit to him and to our young people. Nothing in this Bill conveys the impression that the Government will deal with the problem of unemployment. Unfortunately what we have here is a Bill to shift administrative responsibility from four organisations to one. There is no proposal to reduce the size, the cost or the manpower of these bodies. On the contrary, significant proportions of this Bill are devoted to cast iron projections ensuring the transfer and preservation of all features of the existing bodies and an implicit view that the present activities of these bodies will be expanded and developed in the years ahead. One must question the fundamental philosophy underlying the area of industrial training and temporary employment schemes. One can anticipate the legitimate training needs of industry and there is no question but that the State has a role to play in this area but the State should also ensure that industry pay all the costs. That is of vital importance.
There are other areas which will come under the aegis of this Authority, for instance, employment schemes, job placement and so on. Serious reservations must be entered because in recent years it has been demonstrated that the National Manpower Service were hopelessly unsuccessful in placing people in employment and it has now been transformed into an agency which promises and administers temporary employment schemes. This is true. As far as young people are concerned the psychological effect of this administration is that this service provides temporary employment; there is nothing permanent about it. There is no future. It is just something to keep young people off the streets for a short period.
Why should it be necessary to enable the Authority to promote their activities outside the State? This would seem to be providing a means so that AnCO can go around Europe wasting taxpayers' money. I question this.
On a point of information, it is to enable them to earn consultancy fees abroad.
I hope in his reply the Minister will substantiate that for me.
I will.
As I said, I have to be critical but I want to be as constructive as possible.
It is a legitimate concern.
I believe this a complete waste of money and I do not think that service has achieved anything. Another point I want to raise is the job of director general. What will be the salary for this position? Will it be a political appointment? I have always suspected political input, especially in top jobs. Whether it be right or wrong a political appointee is directed to carry out the instructions of the appointing Minister. The time has come when this kind of political input should be removed from services of that kind. We have seen instances of the appointment of somebody by one political party today and tomorrow, when there is a change of Government, another move to make another political appointment. I have seen disastrous consequences on account of such appointments. When one approaches any of such appointees they will say: Well, I have been appointed by the Minister and naturally I must carry out a Minister's instructions.
I would ask the Minister to find some neutral body to interview prospective candidates for the job of director general of this Authority, a person who will have all the qualifications necessary to fulfil the post rather than have any political input. In fairness to the potential candidate and the people he will be serving it would be far better that he be completely divorced from any political intervention.
We must examine the growth and development of training and temporary employment schemes, putting an end to the cynical, cosmetic approach to employment. In our recent document entitled A Nation that Works— a blueprint for jobs, fair taxation and social justice — we proposed a number of things in this area. We contended that the rip-off from external training courses run by AnCO represented a reduction in the administrative overheads of AnCO, CERT, the Youth Employment Agency and the National Manpower Service. We also proposed the cessation of the uncontrolled expansion of employment schemes not properly policed, reviewed, examined, and for whose effectiveness nobody can vouch. We believe there are areas where community work could be fruitfully undertaken by unemployed people but that such should come under the auspices of the relevant local authorities. We are not using local authorities to the extent we should. After all, they are the people on the ground who know exactly the kind of employment available to young people. Of course there are public representatives serving on local authorities who inform their executive officers of the areas in which employment is most urgently needed.
Let me take the example of my own city, Cork, one of the most depressed areas in terms of employment in recent years. I know of local authority housing schemes, comprised of anything up to 500 houses, with 500 families living in them where, if one found 50 people employed, that would be a lot. In Cork there is the Mahon area of Blackrock. Then one can look to the other side of the city, at Farranree and Gurranebraher. The people on the ground there are the members of the local authority, co-ordinating their efforts with the executive officers of the authority, who know best the kind of work and where it is available for young people. We are not availing of that kind of information that is available from local authorities. We can set up any type of body we like but, if they are not prepared to establish some link with local authorities, then I fear for their future. The Minister should give this matter serious consideration. I recall the Minister being in the Mayfield area of Cork a year or so ago when he heard the views of the people, people giving of their time and effort voluntarily, in promoting the welfare of young people. These people must be consulted at all times as far as the employment of our young people is concerned.
I want to place emphasis on apprenticeship courses. I would ask the Minister to put a stop to this waste of time and effort on the part of young people. I acknowledge that it removes them from the unemployment list for the period of their apprenticeship but we must realise the damage we are doing them. If nothing else, this new authority should prepare a record of such young people throughout the country so that we will have some follow-up. I would appeal to employers, when employing people, that they give what I might call unbaked apprentices consideration. They find themselves in a wilderness looking for some employer to give them another one and a half years work. If that were done, even if they had to emigrate later, they would have a trade or some worthwhile qualification. In replying I hope the Minister can assure me that the thousands of young people who have undergone one and a half year apprenticeship courses with AnCO — now walking the streets of our towns and cities in search of employment — could be given an opportunity of completing their apprenticeship.
I may have further comments to make on Committee Stage. I felt I had to emphasise the hardship being experienced by young apprentices. I know the hardship and anxiety it creates in homes, the anxiety of a boy coming home from an AnCO course saying: I have now completed my one and a half year course, where do I go from here, who will give me a job for the remaining year and a half? If the Minister could resolve that problem he would be doing young people a great service. I know of the Minister's interest and dedication in this field and I would ask him to give it special and careful consideration.
I welcome the Bill and its basic philosophy. I welcome also the publication in September last of the White Paper on Manpower Policy. I might commend the Minister on its production. As he points out in that document it is approximately 20 years since a White Paper on manpower policy was published. That was in 1965. That was the year I finished my training and left University College Dublin with a degree. I was reflecting on the enormous changes that have taken place in the skills needed in our workforce and on the difficulties that face young people nowadays compared with 1965. I qualified in September 1965 with a pass science degree. When I had not got a job five weeks after I received my degree — I was the last of my group to get a job — my mother thought I would be unemployed for the rest of my life. By the sixth week I had a job in industry where I stayed for nine years. If I were to come out of college now with the same kind of degree I would probably find it extremely difficult to get employment. People need all sorts of extra skills nowadays to be of value to the different industries. We have gone through very changing times and it is a disgrace that it has taken 20 years to produce another White Paper on manpower policy.
In the past 20 years we tended to flounder around, pick up policies, try them out and cast them aside if they were not the right ones. In recent years we have been getting the act together. This policy paper has helped and has led to the Bill before us. It is interesting to note, and I am sure it was relevant to the preparation of this White Paper, that in the NESC report entitled Manpower Policy in Ireland and published in 1985, it is recommended that it is time we rationalised the number of agencies now springing up and undertaking functions that in some instances were overlapping resulting in a great deal of confusion. That report states at pages 263 and 264:
It will have become clear at this stage from some of our earlier comments that we do not consider the existing agency structure in the manpower area to be altogether appropriate. The functions of formulating and executing policy have become intermingled both within the Department and in some of the agencies and this has led to some confusion of roles which has made it all the more difficult to articulate an overall strategy.
The NESC recommend three ways in which this inappropriateness could be tackled but they opt for the creating of a single executive agency embracing all existing bodies in the manpower area. One may ask why this did not happen and why these bodies sprung up on their own. It is part of what happened in recent years when new needs became identified and responses were required quickly. The Department set up new agencies in order to answer that need as quickly as possible. In hindsight, to deal in an ad hoc way with manpower policy, was probably not the best course to follow. I welcome the fact that we are now beginning to stitch it all together.
We are all aware of the criticism that arises from the overlapping of a number of the agencies. The overriding problem I have found in my constituency work is the utter and total confusion among people for whom these agencies have been set up. One may wonder why there is still confusion because there is a great deal of time and money spent advertising these agencies and trying to spell out what they are there for. Most people do not read about these agencies and do not know why they are there until perhaps they become unemployed or need the services of one of them. They then start to look at the different acronyms that represent these agencies, whether it is the YEA, AnCO or some of the employment schemes. I sometimes wondered why there was a lack of willingness on the part of the agencies to make information available about each other so that if a public representative or a member of the public found that one agency was not suitable to their needs, that agency would know where to send them.
When one considers that in 1981 there were 22,500 people under 25 years of age in training schemes and that by 1986 that figure had grown to 66,500 one will realise that the training and preparation of young people for employment is very big business. I find it difficult to go along with Deputy Wyse's contention that people who take part in training and who do not immediately get employment are the worse off for having done the training. It is necessary to make sure that the training is relevant, effective and useful to them but it is false to say that even if a person cannot get a job after completing a year or a year and a half of training, he is worse off than if he did not have the training. He must be the better for those extra skills and the extra confidence gained from the training. I would hate to see us abandon programmes on the basis that young people cannot get jobs automatically at the end of the programme. That would be a very shortsighted policy to adopt. Maybe I misunderstood Deputy Wyse. Is he recommending that we abandon AnCO or YEA programmes because young people find they are not immediately getting jobs after taking part in those programmes? As somebody who has sat on interview boards for various organisations I realise that people look for the extra training, the extra skill and the extra confidence that a young person exudes from having taken part in those programmes. Even if we had full employment as there was in 1965, we would still need a relevant and effective training system so that people have the skills they need.
I find the National Manpower Service a total mystery. I can never find out why I continually get complaints from people who are on lists in the National Manpower Service for two, three or four years and never get an offer of a job. When I contacted the agency I was told that that could not be possible yet I continue to meet people who have been unemployed for a couple of years and have not had any contact from the agency. I hope that this Bill and the rationalisation it will bring about will convince me that the National Manpower Service is working properly. Undoubtedly, it was set up to find jobs for people. Deputy Wyse was correct in saying that a lot of their work involves steering people through the temporary works schemes and the enterprise allowance scheme. That is part of their work and they are doing it effectively. Constituents I have spoken to have told me they have been able to obtain all the relevant information they require but there must be more concentration on their overall role, to find employment and steer people towards proper jobs. It is a mystery why they do not concentrate on that role.
It is surprising how ignorant people are about what to do when they find themselves unemployed. They sign on at the unemployment exchanges, get their payments and then complain if they are not called for jobs. However, very often one discovers that they have not signed on with Manpower. Those people think that when they sign on at the local employment exchange they are indicating they are available for any job that may turn up at local authorities and so on. It should be obligatory on those drawing benefit or dole to sign on with Manpower. People should be made aware of the importance of signing on with Manpower. The Department should embark on an information programme and hand out leaflets at the local exchanges highlighting the importance of that. It is extraordinary that one must continuously remind people that jobs are not offered to them simply because they have signed on at the exchange. It is difficult to get across to them that they must sign on with Manpower also. When people hear of vacancies in local authorities they approach councillors and TDs for help and when they are asked if they have signed with Manpower their response, in most cases, is that they have not. There is nothing one can do to have such people interviewed for the job if they have not signed on with Manpower. There must be an automatic tie-in between signing on for welfare and signing on with Manpower. I hope the Minister will deal with that matter later.
A body like AnCO, because of its size, will always come in for some criticism. There is no doubt that that organisation have been extremely effective, particularly in recent years. There is a recognition that it is not enough to train people if the qualification obtained is not needed in industry. The people involved are not much better off with the AnCO qualification in that event.
I am pleased to note that most of the AnCO courses are directly relevant to what is required in the workplace and in the subsuming of AnCO into the new body I hope those in charge of training will ensure that local centres are kept aware of the needs of industries in their catchment areas. It is not enough for AnCO officials to compare notes with their colleagues in other centres. That is not what they are employed for; they are not there to play one centre off against another. Those officials must investigate the different industries and ascertain the type of skills required before they arrange their courses. That work is being done at present and I hope it will continue under the new body. I have heard many colleagues from rural areas praise AnCO officials who organise courses but it is easier to discover the needs of industries in rural area and adapt courses accordingly.
AnCO receive an enormous sum of money from the European Social Fund. In 1986 the ESF grant was in the region of £55 million. There are those who criticise AnCO and accuse them of devising courses and training programmes in order to be able to claim money from the ESF. I do not know if that is true but some people believe it is. It essential that we do not allow that to happen. Every programme prepared by AnCO should be relevant, effective and efficient. Programmes should not be prepared so that we can draw money from the ESF and reduce the number on the unemployment register. We need to monitor what is going on and how the money is being spent.
In 1986 a total of 2,304 people were employed by AnCO, according to the White Paper. That is more than the biggest company in Ireland. It is because that body employ so many people that they are open to criticism for wasteful spending. There is an onus on the Department of Labour, and on AnCO, to ensure that all schemes are effective. There is also on onus on AnCO to ensure that their schemes are for the right people. AnCO schemes are funded by the ESF, the youth employment levy and the Exchequer. They are Government schemes and not the property of any AnCO officials or members of community organisations or local bodies who may organise them. People organising such schemes at local level tend to adopt the courses as their own and sell them as if they are financing them. AnCO should be careful and examine the credentials of the groups running the courses. That may be done now but I do not think it is effective in all cases. Some schemes are almost hijacked by local people. I had occasion to complain to AnCO because their posters are being used in my area to promote an individual. The poster was very political and it was not appropriate for AnCO to allow that to happen to their literature. After my complaint the posters were withdrawn. I urge AnCO to check out the credentials of those running local courses.
I should like to refer to the YEA. Deputy Wyse emphasised the need to train our young people. It is interesting to note the comments of Alan Graham, President of the National Youth Council of Ireland, on the White Paper. He said that much of the White Paper had focused on the new mega agency, the national manpower authority. He said that the National Youth Council of Ireland were adamant that there must be a specific provision for youth in the new structures. He wanted to see the expertise of the YEA retained in the new setup and it was also of concern to him that the Government, and the public, might believe that by submerging the Youth Employment Agency, dropping "youth" from the employment level and removing age restrictions on youth employment schemes they have somehow removed the youth employment problem at a stroke. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is important that the Government should continue to focus on the huge growth in the 15 to 25 age group. We must continue to recognise the special needs of that sector.
It appeared to me that the YEA were running into the difficulty of drawing the line between dealing with people who are 25 and those who are 25 years and six months. The agency should be able to look at job prospects for people who are older than 25 years of age. There would be no point in people working in a vacuum unless people could take into account what would be available for them after the age of 25 years. Recently the YEA came to talk to the enterprise and employment committee of Dublin County Council and concern was voiced that although the agency's terms of reference allowed them to deal with people between the ages of 15 and 25 years they had to keep themselves acquainted with the availability of work for those older than 25 years, because it was appreciated that life does not stop at 25 years. The agency said they were concerned always about the progress of the people who came to them.
It is important to reflect on the enormous amount of money being spent on youth programmes. In 1986 the total spent by a variety of agencies and groups on work schemes will be £154.9 million, whereas in 1981 it was only £48 million, an enormous increase in the meantime. It is a sad reflection on the numbers who have to avail themselves of these schemes because of shortage of employment. However, I do not look on it all as being negative. At the end of their training the people involved will be much more skilled in preparation for our emergence from the recession we have been in. Therefore, the money will not have been wasted. Even though the money is being spent and many people are benefiting, it does not allow for complacency because we must be examining what is being done with the money. This new training authority will be able to do that.
When touring around some of the AnCO centres I found that one of the most effective sectors is that catering for the renewal of skills or the improvement of skills, particularly for long term unemployed people over the age of 40 years. Those people felt they had been thrown on the heap, never again to get jobs. The emphasis behind the social employment scheme was to give people two and a half days work every week and to let them use the rest of the week to increase their incomes by doing some other work without being disqualified for unemployment benefit or assistance. One of the snags attached to that scheme is that many who would qualify under it do not have the skills or other requirements to utilise the other two and a half days per week. Courses for people in the older age group allow people to get themselves slowly back into the workforce, whether in house building, home decorating, electronics, plumbing or other skills so badly needed.
I was talking to a friend yesterday who had spent an entire weekend trying to get an electrician to do a simple job. She could have got somebody to rewire the whole house, somebody who would light up a supermarket, but she could not get a simple job done: the electricians were gone into the big time and there was no one left to do simple little jobs. Therefore, it is important that the schemes I have been referring to should be continued. They will enable people to come back into the workforce who would otherwise be depending on the State.
There will be four trade union members on the new authority. Something has happened in the last few years in regard to temporary employment schemes. When they were announced it was made quite clear that they would be temporary in order to spread them around as much as possible and give as many as possible the opportunity to attain skills. What has been consistently hapening is that trade unions have been lobbying for those who come in on those schemes to be kept on. It is a very severe lobby. When the environmental work scheme was being phased out there was a terrible furore in several county councils. If the trade unions had got their way, automatically any vacancies that arose in local authorities would be given to people being employed on the temporary schemes. That would have meant that those older than 25 years could not get anything from a local authority. That defeated the purpose of those schemes. Trade unions must bear that in mind, and I am glad to see that there will be trade union representatives on the board, working in unison with the agencies that are to be combined under this Bill. I hope those union representatives will play their part and realise the reason for these schemes. We are similarly getting a heavy lobby on behalf of those on temporary schemes in the Civil Service. It was made quite clear that this training would be for a year only, but we are now being told that those people must be given permanent jobs as they become available. It is important that everybody would understand the position in this regard.
I should like to deal briefly with the other agency, CERT, which will be subsumed into the new authority. It is important to remind ourselves why CERT were established. CERT are a State agency established in 1963, probably the first set up with the primary function of co-ordinating the education, recruitment and training of staff at all levels for the hotel, catering and tourism industry, giving priority to tourism. CERT are the only agency who have a very specific function — the others, including AnCO, are very broadly based, catering for a variety of skills. CERT are one of the great success stories, an extraordinarily effective body. I have personal knowledge of it because my mother works in one of the training colleges for catering. Many times I have heard her talk of CERT and the work they are doing.
There seems to have been a misunderstanding about what would happen to CERT when the new authority would be set up. My understanding is that there was a commitment to ensure that CERT would have a life of their own, that they would be left with their specific function in relation to the hotel, catering and tourism industry. The head of CERT in a statement welcomed the amalgamation of the four manpower agencies and said he is satisfied that CERT will retain their identity within the new authority. I can find no clause in the Bill or in the Minister's speech that says it will retain its own identity. Whether that is an omission or I am just not able to follow the Bill as closely as I should, I do not know.
The Minister said that the major part of the Bill is concerned with the establishment of the new body to be called the National Employment and Training Authority and will take over functions at present exercised by the four existing agencies, and that once the new authority is established the four existing agencies will cease to exist. To me that means total amalgamation and the disappearance of CERT as we know it. It is at the moment a limited company, and I strongly urge the Minister to look again at how he intends to deal with CERT in this new training authority. I know that the council of CERT has put forward recommendations as to how they could come under the unbrella body. I would be totally against them being isolated from this umbrella body because they are part of the training system so there is a need for them to be in some way unified with this new authority. But they have put forward recommendations which other speakers have outlined. They have suggested, for example, that the new council of CERT would report to the board of the National Employment and Training Authority to whom it would submit all training programmes and budgets for final approval.
Their concern, and the concern of the hotels industry, is that this agency which has had 100 per cent employment record will no longer be able to identify for their industry the people who are specially trained for them. CERT is probably one of the smallest agencies going in under this heading and they are concerned that they will be so subsumed that they will have no identity at all. The hotels industry have been very concerned about this and have been lobbying to have the Minister look at it again. They thought they would retain their identity as witnessed by the speech by James Nugent in Focus magazine. But now they feel they have been let down in some way.
I know I am not the first to say it but could the Minister look again at this organisation to see whether he can adjust the Bill to allow them to still have some autonomy, to continue to certify their courses, give their diplomas and set down the kind of courses they think are relevant to their industry. It is the only group that is very specific in the industry they cater for. If one goes to AnCO and trains in electronics one can be employed by everybody, and in the hotel industry also; nearly every industry these days needs people with expertise in electronics. But CERT are very specific and are undoubtedly one of the success stories here. We should be careful not to do anything to turn them into something less than the 100 per cent success they have been.
In closing I would like to commend the Minister for his obvious enthusiasm for getting our manpower policy out of the sixties and into the eighties and making us recognise that employment and the chances of employment and the different skills required are not what they were in the sixties. Whether we like it or not employment will never be as available and as full as it was. We must look at employment in a much broader way. This body will help us to do that. We must train for work, for our leisure time, for community activities; we must train people to realise that employment and occupation do not always have to be measured by the amount of money one earns. One can get great job satisfaction out of using skills and talents in areas where perhaps one is not getting paid at all or is being paid very little.
I congratulate the Minister on this Bill and I hope that he will look again, for Committee Stage, at some way he can ameliorate and lessen the worries of CERT.
I welcome this Bill in a qualified way because it has long been Fianna Fáil policy. Particularly has it been the brainchild of our spokesman, Deputy Bertie Ahern. We in Fianna Fáil have seen the proliferation of new schemes some of which have succeeded, some of which have failed and quite a few of which have led to a dead end. There has been considerable overlapping and covering up. There is obviously plenty of money for the schemes, for the public relations jobs to pretend that everything is well, and for hanging out the bunting and the tinsel.
But the time is long past for this change. I compliment the Minister on stealing the ideas that we put forward, and we welcome them. I am glad to see the Government taking up some of the ideas we had because I do not believe they have too many of their own. God knows, the Government were too busy hanging on to their own jobs last night, 80 of them or 81 if we count the Ceann Comhairle, to bother about jobs for other people.
However, the Minister for Labour has seen the light and deathbed conversions are very welcome. In the last days of the Roman Empire even some of the emperors were converted to Christianity. I cannot imagine how emperors were converted but I did not think Tánaistí or Taoisigh would be converted.
The plan is to replace AnCO and CERT and the National Manpower Agency and the Youth Employment Agency with this umbrella body called the National Employment and Training Authority. Some people referred to it today as NETA. I thought it might be "NEATA". Anyhow I hope it will be "neeta" and I hope it will be "beta" and I hope it will be more relevant to the needs of Ireland today.
However, in regard to this umbrella body, I agree with the previous speakers' remarks about CERT. I am aware of the very prominent part played by CERT in the hotel industry. I have seen their good work at first hand. I believe that when something is going well it should be left alone. It is a good maxim to change something only when one is sure it will be replaced with something better. CERT are good at their job and have proved their worth. The finished product is good and well sought after. The trainees from CERT are sure of getting jobs.
I am sure also that the hotel and catering industry could be built up into the biggest money spinner in Ireland next to agriculture. We should foster it because it will provide employment and encourage investment in the country. There is a general call from all sides of the House that CERT should have a life of its own and an identity of its own. I am afraid it will be amalgamated into this group and we will have a dull uniformity of all bodies. We have one success story that we should leave to itself.
In Kildare we are very partial to a dead cert. But I hope this CERT will be a live CERT and left on its own. But I feel very dubious when I see a Bill like this and wonder if it is just another sop to the tattered remnants of the Labour Party as they totter along with their unwilling partners in their last few days in office. There will not always be O'Leary's to give the Government the kiss of life and there will be plenty of Joe Berminghams to stand on their oxygen tubes when they are struggling for survival. But we will always have the case of the dying wasp stinging people and I dread the thought of the director general being appointed by the present Minister or by any Labour Minister for that matter. As well as that he will appoint 15 ordinary members so he will have a captain and a full team. That is what I read into the speech I saw.
On a point of information, they will be nominated by different organisations.
Then there is section 9 which specifies that no Members of the Oireachtas can be appointed to the Authority.
That is a standard provision.
What would the Minister say to ex-Members of the Oireachtas? It might be a good thing for the Minister to think about it. Being rejected by the electorate does not mean that one will be rejected by the Minister. Look at the job Brendan Halligan got in Bord na Móna, and the mess he made of it, and all the people that will be laid off.
Is the Deputy not very glad he got it or a lot of people would be unemployed?
If the Government are rejected in Finglas they can be fairly certain they will be rejected in Ferbane as well. So I hope the Minister has another think about that and will put the proper people in — people who will do the job.
I note this new Authority will see as part of their work assessing persons seeking employment elsewhere in the community. Also they would undertake a provision of consultancy and manpower-related services overseas but only on a commercial basis.
I disagree with Deputy Wyse's remarks and I compliment the Minister, although some might construe that as an admission of defeat and an acceptance of emigration. It is good to see people facing up to reality. This Government have failed to provide jobs at home and at least he was frank enough to say they are going to give them the best chance possible to better themselves abroad. Recently a man came to me with a proposal. He would employ labour and was confident that he could find 300 to 400 jobs for people in Holland and possibly in Germany. They would be working in the EC anyhow, and we talk about a common market and mobility of employment. Some of these jobs were in the building trade but other skilled workers were required such as nurses and hotel workers. His big worry was that he would need funding for the project. In some of the schemes it could well be 90 days from the time they would enter into the contract with him before the money would be available to them, 300 to 400 people in jobs for about three months represent a sizeable amount of money. Of course, immediately the funds started to flow and their wages came they would pay back every penny. He asked if there was any possibility of grants being available to him within the Department — although this was purely a commercial undertaking — to fund this enterprise. The answer I got, which I expected, was that it was "no go". Therefore, that enterprise fell by the wayside and he said he would go elsewhere, possibly to Britain for the funding required. I believe the man was intelligent. He made a success of his life and business abroad and got the contacts that would have given Irish people the jobs abroad.
I hope the idea the Minister mentioned will fill the need which please God, will not be a need forever. Deputy Seán Lemass could say in his time to the skilled workers "Come back to Erin", and we hope that after a period of solid, single party Government here, Deputy Lemass's son-in-law will be able to say the same thing and tell those people to come home.
Regarding education and languages, we are a most insular people and we are desperately ignorant as far as linguistic accomplishments are concerned. We are at a frightful disadvantage. The only advantage we have is that in the main people know some English and no matter where we go we can utilise that, but when we are forced to turn to anything else we are badly served indeed. Up to now it seemed that the emphasis in most schools was on French. I am glad that it is turning a little towards German. Education should not be seen as divorced from jobs. I see them as complementing each other, and I regret there is not as much liaison as I would like to see between the two Departments. I hope we will overcome that language barrier.
The section in the Bill providing for jobs for people abroad is nothing to be ashamed of. Instead of protesting that 30,000 young people are now emigrating, we should help and guide them. We should not just sweep our surplus young people across the Irish sea or see them maybe slip illegally into the USA, where life is not all roses for them at the moment. Whether they are classified as wetbacks or greenbacks, they are being sought out and there is a danger they will be sent home where there is nothing much for them. Therefore, it is out duty to press the US, if they are our friends, to open the doors a little wider and provide visas and work permits for our young people.
I am worried at the lack of emphasis in this Bill on education. Education is a training for life. We have evolved a reasonably good educational system and I have seen it from both sides of the desk. This Government and other Governments have changed education in some ways. I will not go on to the matter of discipline, but some of the changes were not for the better and if we could row back a bit many of us would gladly do so. Education is proposed to enrich one's life. That is grand if you have a few bob in your pocket to buy the necessities of life. It is easy then to talk about enriching it, but education cannot be divorced from reality. It can be reasonably broad at national school or primary level. By right the emphasis there should be on the three Rs. They are priority areas that have been allowed to decline. Perhaps in years to come somebody will get the bright idea that the curriculum should be changed again and will resurrect table books, learning by rote and other things that have been thrown out of the window. Possibly in 20 years time some guru in the educational world will find that these things were necessary. However, second and third level education must be linked with the realities of life after school. There must be links between the person leaving school and the opportunities that exist in the workplace outside.
Developments in the European Communities Twenty-eighth report published in July 1986 on page 66 deals with a formal meeting of Ministers and I quote paragraph 13.14.
A paper containing an action programme for employment growth was presented jointly by the United Kingdom, Ireland and Italy for the purposes of an initial exchange of dues. The initiative concentrated on the following four main areas where action might be taken in tackling the problems of employment.
—promoting enterprise and employment,
—flexible employment patterns and conditions at work,
—vocational training,
—long term unemployment,
and proposed a number of specific measures in each area. The paper will be discussed further by the Council at its informal meeting in September, 1986.
I note the emphasis there on vocational training. Long before any of these bodies we are speaking about today surfaced or were thought about, vocational education was a pioneer in doing the very job the Minister is trying to do, and that sector existed on a shoestring. I have experience of the vocational system as it exists in my county of Kildare, and I defy anybody to get better value for money than that vocational education system gives. They are being screwed to the ground with regard to expenses, and 1 per cent of their budget is allowed for administration. As the system has expanded more pupils have availed of it. They are the unsung heroes of vocational training. Moneys that are showered elsewhere could well be channelled in that direction and thus yield a better return. Let me tell you that in a certain vocational school all comers are enrolled and accepted. There is no such thing as creaming or streaming of pupils there, and 84 per cent of the pupils who enrol in the first year persevere and stay in the school and gain their leaving certificate. Is that not a fairly good result? Those results are achieved with the lowest outlay of money per capita in the country. Will Members not agree we are getting good value for money there?
I would say that up to now education and labour have been divorced. There has been a tug-of-war between the two Departments. They are overlapping. Each of them have looked after their own interests, have wanted to make sure of their perpetuation and there has been very expensive duplication. Some of them had embarked on empire building. Certain sections had no scarcity of money while great pruning took place in other sections. This must stop and we must ask ourselves some questions. This year why did 1,100 students present themselves for first year BA examination with 600 night students on the same quest? We must have freedom of choice and we cannot tell people what they should do, but what is to become of all of these people afterwards? Are they all for export? Is it realistic to allow them to spend three to four years in an institution studying to pass an examination to find at the end of two or three years that it is a dead end? Why in other faculties do we allow so many first students to enroll and then we make a conscious decision before the papers are even examined that 50 per cent will fail because there will not be places for them next year.
Debate adjourned.