Vol. 428 No. 6
21 Mr. Callely asked the Minister for Enterprise and Employment if his attention has been drawn to the difficulties being experienced due to the embargo on recruitment of participants on social employment schemes; when it is likely that the embargo will be lifted; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
Recruitment to the Social Employment Scheme is continuing with around 15,500 participating at the moment of whom some 2,300 were recruited from the beginning of January up to the end of February, 1993.
The Exchequer funding available for the scheme this year is £83.811 million which allows for average participation of around 13,500 participants as against 12,000 last year.
There was a large intake to the scheme towards the end of 1992 bringing the total on the scheme at the end of last year to 15,558. As a result some disruption of projects is inevitable due to the need for FÁS to manage the scheme so that expenditure does not exceed the available funding.
I am, however, looking at the overall resources available to my Department to see if there is scope for a reallocation of additional resources to the Social Employment Scheme so that the numbers on the scheme could continue at around 15,000.
