Vol. 431 No. 5
7 Mr. B. O'Keeffe asked the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications the number of persons within his Department who are currently operating on a work-sharing basis; and if he intends to encourage a higher percentage of his staff to become involved in work-sharing projects.
There are 18 officers currently operating on a job-sharing basis within my Department.
My Department endeavours to be as flexible as possible in facilitating applicants for job sharing, while operating within the guidelines of the scheme.
I am very interested in this question. Will the Minister agree, before there can be any significant takeup of job sharing in his Department, or indeed generally, that those offering to job share need some encouragement with paid work at present and which would render the prospect of job sharing more generally acceptable in addition to drastically reducing our unemployment figures?
That is a question which should be directed to the Minister for Finance.
