I move:
That a sum not exceeding £126,311,000 be granted to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending 31st December 1988 for the salaries and expenses of the Office of the Minister for Labour including certain services administered by that Office, and for payment of certain grants and grants-in-aid.
In working to regenerate our economy, this Government are committed to working together with the national organisations of employers and trade unions and other representative bodies to improve the social equity of our society. Since its establishment a central objective of the Department of Labour has been to keep open the lines of communication between employers, trade unions and Government at national level in the interests of improving the conduct of industrial relations and the performance of the economy. My Department have an important role to play in ensuring that the strategies pursued by Government, employers and trade unions in restoring competitiveness are attentive to the need to maintain a proper balance between equity and efficiency in the labour market.
In response to the competitiveness challenge, the Department of Labour are engaged in a critical examination of the entire range of their programmes. This examination and the current spending requirements on which this Estimate is based maintain a balance between the objective of securing savings in public expenditure and the need to maintain services to assist the disadvantaged and to promote the full development of our human resources. The Programme for National Recovery has outlined an extensive programme of labour law reform. Legislation is, of course, only one means alongside other public policies and the collective bargaining process in maintaining employment standards. In a global economy, employment standards have to be shaped so as to help Ireland become a more effective competitor. This calls for the development of more co-operative relationships between employers and trade unions, based more on compatible goals than on conflict.
Member states of the European Community are finding that high rates of economic growth are not, for various reasons, being converted into increases in employment. In our case, however, real economic growth, investment confidence and the stable economic environment which is underpinned by the Programme for National Recovery are accompanied by practical development measures which are creating extra jobs. The agreement to double by 1992 the Structural Funds will enhance those development efforts especially in the productive and infrastructural area and for employment schemes. Deputies will be familiar with the measures which have been announced to meet the specific job objectives of the Programme for National Recovery. The objectives are as follows: a total of 4,000 new first time jobs were created in the first quarter of 1988; in the same period some 240 project start-ups have been recorded by the industrial development agencies across the overseas, indigenous and small industry sectors; twenty-four projects have been approved for the international financial services centre at the Custom House Docks involving a job content of approximately 1,000; over 2,000 new first time jobs have been created in the food industry in the past year.
While manpower programmes cannot and should not be equated with real jobs — they are very often the means to lead unemployed people back to the labour market — their importance should not be understated. I will be returning to these programmes later.
My Department's annual report for 1987 provides details of recent unemployment trends. The principal features are first that the total at work continued to fall last year except in the private services sector and, secondly, that unemployment has fallen slightly over the last 12 months. While part of this latter development is due to emigration and the effectiveness of Jobsearch, we should not ignore the underlying favourable development in the real economy.
The change in the live register seems to have heralded not only a halt to the long, steady upward spiral in unemployment which had persisted for years but also a substantial year-on-year decrease in the numbers out of work for the early months of this year. At the end of April there were 241,700 registered as unemployed compared with 250,000 in April 1987, representing a fall of 9,000 over the year. Seasonally adjusted, unemployment is now at its lowest level in 18 months.
The combating of long-term unemployment features as one of the objectives of the European Community's Structural Funds. This underlines the commitment at Community level to preventing and to reducing this most serious of social problems. In our own case long-term unemployment, that is unemployment in excess of 12 months, hovers around 45 per cent of total unemployment. The most recent figures available reveal a small decline in long term unemployment — the first reduction in several years.
The Programme for National Recovery aims to strengthen our indigenous manufacturing sector so that it can achieve the size and the vitality which other small economies have achieved. It also aims to continue, but on a more selective basis, to attract overseas manufacturing companies. Economic growth and performance need to be accompanied by measures to improve the functioning of the labour market, raise educational and training levels and adapt their content to present and future requirements. While these strategies can prevent a recurrence of long term unemployment in future on the scale of today's historical high levels, they need to be supplemented by actions which reintegrate the long term unemployed into the labour market, and stop those who become unemployed from drifting into long term unemployment.
I turn now to my priorities for 1988 as they relate to this important area of the work of my Department. That importance is underlined by the sheer scale of the financial commitment involved. This year, FÁS will receive grant-aid from the Labour Vote of £113 million, towards the costs of overall expenditure of over £180 million. CERT will receive £2.5 million towards its overall budget of £6 million.
I should point out to Deputies that the establishment of FÁS has given rise to a variation in the presentation of the 1988 Estimate compared with the way in which the gross Estimate had been calculated in the past. The full details of this format are outlined in the Revised Book of Estimates. Briefly, in 1987 European Social Fund grants due in respect of certain employment and training schemes run by the National Manpower Service were treated as appropriations-in-aid on the Labour Vote and the full cost of the programmes shown under the respective subheads.
In 1988 these grants, totalling over £10 million, will be received by FÁS directly. Secondly, in 1987 the Votes for postprimary education and higher education received over £33 million from the youth employment levy through the Department of Labour Vote. The allocation to the Department of Education of £30 million from the employment and training levy is no longer channelled through the Department of Labour Vote but is allocated direct to the respective post-primary and higher education Votes.
The establishment of FÁS as the training and employment authority is the single most important development in the manpower area in recent years. FÁS have taken over the functions of three former agencies. They have a vital role to play in the development and use of all manpower resources and I am confident that FÁS will be able now to offer a greatly improved service to their main clients, the unemployed.
One of my major objectives in setting up FÁS was to create an integrated set of programmes for the public. Previously many people did not know whom to approach for information or access to an employment and training programme. The local FÁS office will now be able to offer a comprehensive service of information, advice and referral. FÁS have already started refurbishing their offices to provide a more efficient service, together with a more attractive atmosphere. Deputies will be aware that a central information service has been set up for public representatives which should help to provide speedier information in response to specific requests on individual cases.
The establishment of FÁS is, of itself, a major step towards the integration of programmes. FÁS have begun a farreaching review, at my request, of the scope for rationalising the existing range of employment schemes and training programmes in order to provide a more responsive service to individual clients. In the enterprise area for example, each of the three former agencies had their own programmes and these are being examined with a view to developing a comprehensive programme with a variety of modules which can be put together as needed to suit the individual client's needs. Other programmes are similarly being reviewed. I hope that this rationalisation will lead to a better and more cost-effective service.
In the general area of cost-effectiveness FÁS are working to ensure that savings can be achieved in each area with the least disruption in service. A number of steps have been taken to reduce overheads in FÁS. Total staff numbers are being reduced through the voluntary early retirement package. Other staff are being moved from administrative and overhead activities to work on direct training or employment activities, in particular Jobsearch and employment schemes. All overheads are being critically examined and any measures necessary to eliminate overlap or waste will be taken.
As a further step to becoming both more client-centred and more cost effective, FÁS will operate as a genuine regionally structured organisation. This will ensure that the needs and concerns of individuals and local communities will be catered for effectively and in a flexible manner at local level. The regions will participate in the overall planning process and FÁS programmes can be targeted more closely to local needs. This will help to encourage local initiative and experimentation and will also facilitate better co-operation with other local organisations.
Despite continuing efforts to reduce costs and streamline the provision of services, the resources available for manpower services will remain limited. I am most concerned to ensure that these resources are used to improve the position of the most disadvantaged people in the labour market. I have therefore given FÁS two priorities in programmes for the unemployed — the long term unemployed and early school leavers with no formal qualifications.
FÁS have a major role to play in the Jobsearch programme, in co-operation with the Department of Social Welfare. Some 65 per cent of FÁS recruitment must come from the live register, thus ensuring that those longest out of work have the chance to learn new skills and improve their chances of finding employment. Other FÁS recruitment comes principally from the early school leaver category.
The apprenticeship system is one of the key programme areas which I have identified in guidelines issued to FÁS as a subject for urgent assessment and change. While apprenticeship has served us well in the past, it must be updated to meet the needs of a modern economy.
I have asked FÁS to make recommendations by the end of this year on the development of a flexible system which can provide high standards and yet reduce the currently high cost to the State. Industry must be prepared to take up its responsibilities in developing specialised skill training and to pay a more equitable share of the cost.
The combination of resources within FÁS will also give added impetus to planning for equal opportunities. Building on the initiatives pursued by its forerunners, the new streamlined Authority is to bring forward an integrated action programme identifying opportunities for positive action. FÁS are not short of ideas and have already built up considerable experience in this regard. They will be devoting special attention to working with employers to encourage them to take more young women into employment, particularly in the non-traditional types of work for which they are now being trained.
FÁS will also play an important role in the development of co-operatives. Parallel to the Community enterprise programme, FÁS plan to establish a specialised service to promote the cooperative concept and provide expert advice and counselling services.
These new initiatives meet the commitment contained in the Programme for National Recovery and reflects the outcome of consultations with the key interests involved. Worker co-operatives were seen in the terms of the programme as having a significant contribution to make in employment maintenance and job creation. I intend as Minister for Labour to ensure that arrangements for the support of co-operatives are better co-ordinated and that co-operatives are given the kind of specialised assistance they require to enable them to pursue employment initiatives with realistic commercial prospects.
The issue of the free movement of workers has become increasingly important in the context of the completion of internal market. FÁS provide detailed counselling services to people considering working abroad. It is also the most appropriate source of advice for young people about the difficulties involved in leaving this country without adequate preparation. This applies particularly to those who have no qualifications and, therefore, little prospect of success abroad. What FÁS can do is to try to redirect them to manpower opportunities in Ireland.
Despite cuts in most other areas of State expenditure, the Government have maintained the 1988 allocation for emigrant advisory services at its 1987 level of £250,000.
The bulk of these funds, which are released by me on the recommendation of DÍON, are currently directed towards improving and developing the reception services mounted by voluntary agencies in Britain for newly arrived emigrants. DÍON has been trying to ensure that a co-ordinated approach is adopted in the development of emigrant welfare services on the part of these agencies, the "settled Irish" represented by the Federation of Irish Societies and the various statutory agencies in London and other urban centres in Britain.
I have been urging employers to recognise that our provision for training and development at company level in Ireland is too narrow, too little and for too few. We certainly need to look more systematically at training needs at enterprise level. It is clear, however, that neither at management level, at the level of technical skills, nor at the level of basic induction training for young people is our overall performance sufficient to ensure that we are fully competitive.
An analysis of the information available from the 1986 labour force survey on training provided in the four weeks prior to the survey revealed that only 5.5 per cent of all employees had received some training or education in that period. We lag behind Britain in this respect where the comparable figure was over 10 per cent. We must acknowledge the existence of a significant training gap compared with our competitors in Europe. Training will have to come to be regarded as a matter of central importance in the corporate strategy of Irish industry. We need to change employers' attitudes to training and retraining so as to ensure that employees' skills are updated to meet changing needs.
On management development the success or failure of many business enterprises today depends largely on the quality and style of management. Unfortunately, too few firms have demonstrated any long term commitment to management training and development.
There are many routes to management and there is a variety of institutions and organisations engaged in the provision of management education and training, involving substantial Exchequer subventions. I believe there is considerable scope for rationalisation in this area to enable better use to be made of existing facilities and to co-ordinate the work of third level educational institutions, State training agencies and the Irish Management Institute. That was one of the reasons I appointed an Advisory Committee on Management Training in July 1987. I have asked the committee to make recommendations to me on how management training can contribute more effectively to economic development.
Because of the urgent need to raise the general standard of management throughout all sectors of the economy, I have asked the committee to report by June this year so that decisions can be made quickly to ensure the best possible provision of management education, training and development from within existing resources.
Since we joined the European Economic Community in 1973, the European Social Fund has provided sustained and invaluable help for vocational training and job creation schemes in Ireland. Ireland has always been a region of absolute priority in the fund and, as a result, has qualified for special consideration and a higher rate of assistance than certain other regions.
The total amount of ESF assistance received by Ireland since 1973 exceeds £890 millions. This money has enabled us to develop a vocational training structure, throughout the country, which we would have otherwise been unable to establish. Our ability to provide a trained workforce has greatly enhanced our attractiveness for foreign investors and the efficiency of our industry has improved. In the current year we expect to be approved for ESF assistance of over £166 millions, which is £4 million more than for 1987.
The budget of the ESF in recent years has not kept pace with the increased demands from member states, particularly since the accession of Greece, Portugal and Spain. As a result the European Commission has been applying stricter criteria for the approval of applications for ESF assistance, and programmes for persons unemployed for more than 12 months. This emphasis by the Commission on programmes which produce economic results, as opposed to programmes of a more social nature may have the effect, in the future, of reducing the level of assistance for some of our programmes.
The agreements reached at the last summit in Brussels on the reform of the structural funds are of major significance in meeting the objectives of the Programme for National Recovery and combating the scourge of unemployment. My Department, together with the agencies under my responsibility, are working with other Government bodies to ensure that the increased resources that we will get under these funds are used to the best possible advantage to increase the productive capacity of the economy, and we will do this in close consultation with the social partners under the Programme for National Recovery.
A very important new development is that Community support can in future amount to up to 75 per cent of the cost of projects or programmes, as compared with the present maximum rate of assistance of 55 per cent. This opens up a whole new range of possibilities. It also means that we will have to improve the quality of our programmes in order to qualify for support.
I attended a meeting of the European Community's Standing Committee on Employment on Wednesday at which I emphasised the commitment made in the context of the Single European Act and the February Council in Brussels to help the less developed regions on the periphery to improve their infrastructure and to reach the same standard as the more favourably located regions.
On work safety and health schemes, developments under way both at home and within the European Community will have profound implications for our future approach to safety and health. In accordance with the commitment in the Programme for National Recovery my priority in 1988 is the introduction of a Bill in the Oireachtas based on the main recommendations of the Barrington Commission of Inquiry on Safety, Health and Welfare at Work. The drafting of the legislation has now reached its final stage. The legislation will set down general safety and health principles applying to all employers, employees and the self-employed. Safety and health issues will have to be taken care of at the workplace under a safety based on an assessment of the hazards that exist.
Consultation and dialogue between employers and workers on safety and health matters will also be an important feature of the new provisions. The legislation will provide for updated enforcement provisions including improvement plans, improvement notices and prohibition notices. The new legislation will provide for the establishment of a national authority for occupational safety and health representative of the social partners and Government Departments. The authority will have overall responsibility for safety and health at work at national level, which will include initiatives in policy, providing an enforcement and advisory service and co-ordinating and guiding education, information and training activities in the area of safety and health at work.
The development of measures relating to occupational safety and health has gained increased momentum in the European Community in preparation for the completion of the internal market by the end of 1992. There is a strong consensus within the Community that the internal market should mean more than just removing tariff barriers. Improvements in worker protection are a major feature of the social dimension of the internal market.
The Labour and Social Affairs Council is currently examining a number of new proposals for directives including: the introduction of measures to encourage improvements in the safety and health of workers at the workplace; and minimum safety and health requirements for workplaces. The European Commission is bringing forward many other draft directives in the area of safety and health at work. These are of particular relevance to us now as many of the proposals are very similar to those arising from the Barrington commission.
These new instruments have obvious implications for our approach to legislative reform in this area. I have been advocating that any proposals for directives should be flexible and carefully produced. There is a clear need for adequate prior consultation with member states and with the representatives of employers and workers before proposals are finalised. We have also emphasised that the special position of small and medium sized enterprises needs to be properly recognised.
On employment law, my Department administer and enforce a very substantial body of labour legislation, including employment regulation orders made under the Industrial Relations Acts. These orders set down minimum pay and conditions in traditionally low-paid or unorganised areas of employment such as clothing, catering, law clerks, hairdressing and agriculture. As a result of inspections carried out by the general inspectorate of my Department, almost £44,000 in arrears of wages were recovered last year. Such monitoring and inspection procedures are justified and do not at all imply a favourable disposition to the maintenance of unnecessary rigidities on the labour market.
I am very conscious, however, of the need to eliminate any superfluous legislative or administrative burdens on employers which can impede their competitiveness and their capacity to provide employment. The removal last year of the 50 year old statutory ban on the employment of women doing industrial night work is a case in point. Employers now have more flexibility in how they make use of their manpower and machinery. I propose to eliminate other regulations which are generally regarded as having outlived their usefulness.
As a further step towards improving equality of opportunity and eliminating unnecessary provisions in worker protection legislation, the Government yesterday lodged in Geneva an instrument to denounce Convention No. 45 of the International Labour Organisation. This action will enable us to remove the current restrictions on the employment of women underground in mines.
One of the areas on which action is called for is occupational safety and health. I am particularly attracted to the Barrington commission's proposal to use legislation to put beyond question important points of principle and to use structural codes and guidelines to advise and to educate people on how those principles are to be observed or implemented. I am particularly conscious of the very large volume of regulations and orders in the occupational safety and health field and the very genuine concerns of employers in this regard.
To ensure that the employment laws are better explained and understood a guide to labour law has been published. This provides in a straightforward and non-technical manner, an immediate outline of the various protective employment measures and it should be of real assistance to workers and employers alike — particularly those in small and medium sized undertakings.
I have also initiated a review of a number of pieces of legislation and a discussion document on possible changes to the Unfair Dismissals Act, the Employment Equality Acts and the Payment of Wages Act has been published. Interested parties have had an opportunity to submit views on the proposals outlined in that document and the range of responses received will allow for full consideration of all aspects before legislative proposals are finally advanced.
A number of Acts covering the conditions of employment of workers are on the Statute Book for over 50 years. Many of the provisions of these Acts were introduced to deal with conditions in a very different employment era. A substantial number of them, or major parts of them, have by now been superseded by subsequent legislation. The question therefore arises as to the relevance of these enactments in present day circumstances. A preliminary review of this body of legislation, which includes the Conditions of Employment Acts, 1936 and 1944, the Shops (Conditions of Employment) Acts, 1938 and 1942, and the Night Work (Bakeries) Acts, 1936 and 1981, is at present being undertaken in my Department.
