Joint Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation debate -
Tuesday, 8 Oct 2013

Pathways to Work 2013: Discussion with Department of Social Protection

Chairman

I welcome Ms Anne Vaughan, deputy secretary general, Mr. John McKeon, assistant secretary general, and Mr. Paul Carroll, principal officer, from the Department of Social Protection, who are here to discuss the Department's Pathways to Work 2013 report, other job creation initiatives and the progress made in the past year. I thank them for appearing before this committee.

By virtue of section 17(2)(l) of the Defamation Act 2009, witnesses are protected by absolute privilege in respect of their evidence to this committee. As everybody present is familiar with the rules of privilege, I will take it as read. I ask Ms Vaughan to make her presentation.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I am accompanied by Mr. John McKeon, assistant secretary general with overall responsible for the Pathways to Work programme, and Mr. Paul Carroll, who is the divisional manager in Dublin north. We have the country divided into 13 operational divisions and I thought it would be helpful for members to hear what is happening on the ground. I hope that between us we will be able to deal with the questions.

I thank the Chairman and members for the opportunity to appear before the joint committee today to discuss the Pathways to Work strategy. The Department has a very broad remit to provide income supports and services to people right across the age spectrum from childhood to working age to retirement age, including jobseekers, people with disabilities, families and carers.

The Pathways to Work strategy is targeted at those people in the working age category who have a capacity to work. It sets out our approach to labour market activation - in other words, our approach to encouraging people to stay engaged with the labour market and supporting them in finding employment. In this regard it is important to note that labour market activation is one of three main functions of the Department. The second main function is payment delivery, and the third is the control of fraud and abuse of the social welfare system. While the three functions are equally important, a balance must be struck between them. Today, I will concentrate primarily on the Pathways to Work activity, and I am pleased to provide for the committee's information a presentation pack which outlines how the Pathways to Work strategy has evolved over the past few years. I do not intend to go through it but I am quite happy to discuss later any aspects of it that members wish.

By way of context, committee members will be aware that Pathways to Work was first launched in February 2012, at a point in time when the unemployment rate stood at 15%, the number of people unemployed as measured by the Central Statistics Office stood at 322,000 and the number of people on the live register claiming jobseeker's payments - which includes people in part-time employment - stood at 439,000. These unemployment figures reflected the dramatic reversal in our nation's fortunes during the period 2008 to 2012, when the level of employment fell from just under 2.2 million to just over 1.8 million.

This reversal in our nation's fortunes led to a dramatic increase in demand for the State's welfare and employment services, which up to 2012 were provided by three separate organisations: the Department of Social Protection, the primary provider of core jobseeker income support payments; the community welfare service of the HSE, the primary provider of supplementary and emergency welfare payments; and FÁS, the primary provider of employment support and training services. As an example of the demands faced by these services, the number of jobseeker claims received by the Department of Social Protection increased more than threefold during the period 2006 to 2009 and the annual increase in the number of beneficiaries across all welfare schemes - that is, the number of new beneficiaries being added to the claim load each year - grew from just under 40,000 in 2006 to more than 270,000 in 2009.

This huge increase in demand for services placed significant pressure on the three State agencies involved in service provision. Partly in response to this pressure but also in response to the recommendations contained in various reports from bodies such as the National Economic and Social Council, NESC, the Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD, it was decided to merge the three agencies in order to provide a one-stop-shop service to customers. This merger, in addition to simplifying the service proposition to customers, facilitated the redesign and reconfiguration of service so as to improve the quality of service. In particular, it enabled the Department to ensure that jobseekers registering for income supports would have earlier access to employment services, and that our scarce case-worker resources would, in line with all international research evidence, be targeted towards those newly unemployed jobseekers who were most at risk of becoming long-term unemployed. This reconfiguration and prioritisation of service capacity was at the heart of the Pathways to Work strategy for 2012 and continues to be core to the ongoing transformation of service in the Department. A key challenge in implementing this transformation is to ensure that the job of activation is aligned with and does not detract from the equally important functions of payment delivery and control.

Pathways to Work is one of the twin-pronged approaches adopted by the Government to address the employment challenge that I have just set out. The other element is the Action Plan for Jobs, which is focused on the task of creating a demand for labour by encouraging and supporting entrepreneurial activity and investment in the Irish economy, and has set a target of adding a net 100,000 jobs to the Irish economy by 2016. Pathways to Work, in contrast, addresses the supply side of the labour market, with a focus on trying to ensure that as many as possible of the new jobs and other vacancies in the economy are filled by candidates taken from the live register. There are a number of key elements to this approach, which were set out the Pathways to Work 2012 document, including the development of the one-stop-shop Intreo to integrate welfare and employment services and deliver an improved customer-focused service to jobseekers; the implementation of client profiling to inform tailored delivery of services; the roll-out of group and one-to-one engagements to inform and advise jobseekers; the affirmation of the concept of rights and responsibilities, via a statement of mutual undertakings, to establish the basis of the relationship between the State and jobseekers; the roll-out of enhanced identity management - the public services card - to help detect and minimise fraud; the introduction of penalty rates of payment for unemployed people who do not engage with the State's employment supports, to reinforce the concept of rights and responsibilities; the roll-out of new employment supports such as JobBridge; the targeting of places on employment and training schemes such as community employment, Tús and Momentum at long-term unemployed people; the development of closer links with employers as a means of securing work opportunities to which job-seekers can be referred; and full integration of the community welfare service, FÁS employment services and the Department of Social Protection to form a new Department of Social Protection organisation.

These developments, when taken as a whole, represent a significant programme of transformation requiring substantial IT, process, staff, organisation and physical infrastructure changes. Notwithstanding that some commentators have questioned the pace at which the Department is implementing this programme, experience in other countries where similar change initiatives have been implemented, such as the UK, France and Norway, indicates a timeline for delivery of five years or more. Given the urgency of the unemployment situation in Ireland we have set ourselves a deadline of the end of next year for completion. So far we have made good progress. FÁS employment services and the community welfare service - some 2,000 staff - were transferred to the Department of Social Protection on time and within budget. New organisation and management reporting structures were implemented during 2012 and the services are now integrated within the Department. The new Intreo model of operation - integrating the relevant employment and payment services - was developed and roll-out commenced in October 2012. Fifteen Intreo offices, serving some 25% of our client base, have been completed to date and our target is to have more than 40 offices fully operational by the end of this year. Group engagement and individual profiling is now fully operational in all Department local offices in advance of the roll-out of the full Intreo service. Also in advance of the roll-out of the full Intreo service, the integrated welfare decisions process is operational in 37 offices and has been instrumental in reducing decision times on welfare claims from around three weeks to around three days in most of the offices concerned. The statement of mutual undertakings is now in force, with penalty rates of payment introduced for jobseekers who do not engage with the State's employment or training services. The national internship scheme, JobBridge, has been rolled out and is delivering a clear pathway to employment for many people. More than 20,000 people have benefited from this scheme, with a rate of progression to employment of more than 60%. The Momentum programme to provide work-focused training to long-term unemployed people was developed, tendered and rolled out - more than 4,000 people are now benefiting from this programme. The number of places available on activation schemes such as CE, Tús and JobBridge was increased by 10,000, an increase of 30%, as part of budget 2013. The Springboard programme has supported more than 10,000 unemployed people in improving their skills for emerging employment opportunities.

Turning now to Pathways to Work 2013, this is a 50-point action plan published in July 2013 which seeks to augment the focus on newly unemployed jobseekers by increasing and intensifying our level of engagement with people who are already long-term unemployed. Among the planned actions that reflect this focus on long-term unemployment are: profiling all clients on the live register, not just new entrants, with a total of 420,000 profiles; developing an Intreo programme for engaging with clients who are long-term unemployed; increasing the number of new clients engaged in group interviews from 30,000 to 85,000 and in one-to-one interviews from 130,000 to 185,000; doubling, through internal redeployment, the number of case workers employed within the Department on activation duties to increase the capacity to engage long-term unemployed people; finalising and implementing proposals for contracting additional capacity from third-party service providers for employment services; implementing reforms to housing support under the new housing assistance payment; eliminating backlogs in the family income supplement, FIS, scheme; implementing the JobsPlus incentive for employers to recruit people who are long-term unemployed; monitoring and encouraging recruitment from the live register by client firms of the Enterprise Development agencies; establishing a labour market council of external policy experts, senior industry figures and representatives of client groups to advise on the implementation and further development of the Pathways to Work approach; and developing and implementing a plan to give effect to the EU youth guarantee in Ireland. Detailed targets have been set to measure the impact of the 50 actions under Pathways to Work 2013, and these are published at quarterly intervals on the Department's website. The report for the end of quarter two is included in the presentation pack and, as can be seen, we are on track to deliver most of the targets set out.

Following years of job losses, there are now tentative, though welcome, signs of progress in the labour market. There was an annual increase in employment of 33,800 in the year to the second quarter of 2013. Unemployment fell by 22,200 in the same period, to 300,700, continuing a downward trend that began at the start of 2012. By the end of September, the number of people on the live register had fallen to 408,000 from a peak of 466,000 in 2010. The unemployment rate, at 13.3%, is down from a peak of 15.1% in early 2012. Despite this progress, however, the jobs and unemployment challenge continues to loom large and remains the primary focus of the Department's transformation agenda.

I trust my comments and the presentation are of benefit to the committee in its consideration of the challenge we all face. I hope I have adequately set out, and given a sense of, the determination and commitment of the Department and its staff to respond to this challenge. I also hope the presentation gives all members an understanding of the scale and complexity of the transformation programme in the Department and, above all, reassures them that we are implementing the programme with energy and at pace.

My colleagues, Mr. McKeon and Mr. Carroll, and I will be pleased to answer questions.

Chairman

I thank Ms Vaughan for the presentation.

Deputy Dara Calleary

I, too, thank Ms Vaughan and her colleagues for the presentation. We should acknowledge the significant changes in the Department in the implementation of this project and that the staff have had to deal with major changes. It is welcome that they have all contributed.

What causes me frustration is that when my colleagues and I table questions to the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovations on Pathways to Work, they are transferred to the Department of Social Protection. It has been difficult to get information on the programme up to now. I welcome Ms Vaughan's presentation and hope we can make this a regular engagement. She mentioned the transfer of 2,000 staff from FÁS and others from the community welfare service to the Department. How many staff in the Department are involved in the Pathways to Work programme?

Ms Anne Vaughan

The Department of Social Protection has a staff of 7,000 to cover all of its services. The total number of case officers, which number is very important to the activation process, is of the order of 300. We want to double that number. The total number of staff involved in the regions is 3,000. I can confirm the final figure.

Deputy Dara Calleary

What is involved in creating a personal profile? I note that it is proposed to profile all clients in 2013 and that some 109,000 personal profiles were created during the second quarter. Is it a desktop exercise? What is actually involved?

Ms Anne Vaughan

First, the person concerned will most probably have been involved in a group engagement and a one-to-one engagement will follow. We will take all of his or her details - age, background, educational attainment - and create a profile. We have developed a diagnostic tool with the ESRI to predict the chances of individuals leaving the live register. This allows us a way of focusing on the people who will find it most difficult to leave it. As I said, Pathways to Work 2012 was focused on new people because we believe the sooner we engage with individuals the better. We have built profiles of new entrants in that way. What we have engaged the ESRI to do is to profile the existing group of long-term unemployed persons and the remaining individuals on the register, using the data we already have for the long-term unemployed. It is an analysis and desk exercise and we will not be meeting the people to be profiled. Once they have been assigned a profile, we will use that information to decide whom we will call first. We cannot see everybody at the same time. We must have some way of deciding on the order in which we will see people. The objective is to engage quickly in order that ideally we identify their needs to enable them to take up employment.

Deputy Dara Calleary

What is the difference between a guidance interview and an update interview? In the second quarter the target figure for initial one-to-one guidance interviews was 90,083, but there was a common number of update interviews at 78,700. Do these figures relate to the same thing?

Ms Anne Vaughan

No, not quite. I will ask my colleague Mr. McKeon to respond to that question.

Mr. John McKeon

The guidance interview is an initial guidance interview, in which the caseworker and jobseeker sit down together. It is the first detailed discussion with a person about his or her skills, background, competencies and the type of jobs he or she might find suitable. He or she will be given advice on developing a personal progression plan. It outlines how a jobseeker might improve his or her prospects of getting a job. The follow-up interviews will possibly take place one to three months later, depending on the case officer's judgment of the client and the profile result, to which Ms Vaughan referred. In the update interview we will look at how the jobseeker has progressed in terms of the things he or she was planning to do for the personal progression plan and what the caseworker has done. If the caseworker has agreed with the jobseeker to try to have him or her placed on a training programme or a Tús programme, what has he or she done for the jobseeker in that month? International experience shows that the update interviews are critically important. The initial interview is important, but the progression rates improve dramatically if there are frequent update interviews.

Deputy Dara Calleary

It was stated recruitment from the live register to the enterprise development agencies was being monitored. I do not see a target figure for this. What monitoring is taking place? Will Ms Vaughan describe the relationship with the enterprise development agencies?

Ms Anne Vaughan

One of the points I make regularly about the Pathways to Work programme is that we must make it work on the ground. We must make it work at local office level, with local employers and agencies. We have been building relationships, be it with ETBs and the representatives of the enterprise agencie, in order those on the live register have a fair chance in seeking the jobs available. The only way to do this is through local contacts. It is very much a local initiative.

At the macro level, through the various arrangements in place for Pathways to Work, we have good relations with the agencies such as Forfás, the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and so on. It is working out at both ends and it is all down to people and local employers. Our staff are trying to have enhanced engagement with employers and the various agencies involved.

Deputy Dara Calleary

Changes were announced to the JobBridge programme and the internship term has been extended to up to two years. Will Ms Vaughan give the rationale to this? Was it an employer demand or a demand of participants? Does it undermine the JobBridge programme in giving people experience and moving them into the fully paid workforce as opposed to an internship? Indecon has also pointed out that many people participating in the JobBridge programme have substantial work experience. Will Ms Vaughan review the programme as graduates find it difficult to get placed under it and they are the ones who need work experience?

Chairman

Before Ms Vaughan addresses those questions, Deputy Seán Kyne will ask his questions as he must leave to go to the Dáil Chamber.

Deputy Seán Kyne

I will read the responses to my questions.

I welcome Ms Vaughan and her colleagues. I also welcome the proposals made and the plan behind the Intreo offices and the integration of those seeking unemployment benefit and finding employment for them and all that it entails. My concern lies with the removal of community welfare offices from remote areas such as mine in Connemara. It can involve a way trip of 60 km to visit an Intreo office and the person concerned must then return home. That is a major source of concern that Deputy Dara Calleary and I raised with the Minister in the Dáil last week.

On the youth guarantee and the developing of a plan, there are issues about developing a final plan in the European Union. If that comes to fruition, will the Department be in a position to roll it out?

In respect of the statement of mutual understanding, what penalties are involved? What is the minimum level of engagement? Is there real engagement in the process?

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will ask Mr. McKeon to comment on the detail of the JobBridge programme because he is involved in the steering group.

We see JobBridge as innovative, as a work in progress. The Indecon report points to how we should change it and be flexible. Our focus is on people on the live register; the Government is very clear about that. Its purpose is to give people on the live register the best chance. In terms of social welfare arrangements, it is a new scheme, it is innovative and it is working well. We were under pressure to review and extend it to other groups and we have done that. We investigate issues at the edges with regard to displacement, abuse, etc. The changes we have made have arisen primarily as a result of the Indecon report. We are open to keeping it and other arrangements under review but it is certainly the way we want to proceed and we see it as one of our very good schemes. We have about 5,000-----

Mr. John McKeon

There are just under 6,000 people currently on the scheme. The change to which the Deputy referred is that previously an intern could do two internships for a maximum duration across both of nine months. We got feedback in the Indecon report and directly from interns and host organisations that circumstances could arise in which an internship ceases for some reason, such as when the host organisation does not satisfy its side of the bargain, or the organisation and the intern are both genuine but are not a good fit. If an intern has completed, say, four months of an internship it effectively precludes him or her from undertaking another, because interns must have a minimum of six months to sign up. In order to give interns a second chance where an internship did not work out the first time, we decided to increase the aggregate duration that an intern could spend on internships to 18 months, but the individual duration is still a maximum of nine months. That is the change we made and it is for the purpose of giving interns a second chance. It was a strong recommendation from interns.

In regard to the point raised about the experience of people on internships, an unfortunate consequence of the recession is that 95%-plus of those on the live register have previous employment experience. It is not the same as previous recessions, when many people came into the labour market and never worked. This time there has been a huge loss of jobs. Therefore, a large number of people on the live register have much experience. I do not think we can preclude people who have been unemployed for at least three months out of a period of six months from participating on an internship just because they have experience. We do not have statistics on this, but anecdotally - I try to meet as many jobseekers as possible - many of those who work find internships work best for them. They may be people in their mid-40s to mid-50s who have been made unemployed and cannot get back on the employment ladder because employers are seeking recent graduates. A person in that age group will be accepted on an internship and then it is discovered that they have far more experience and better life skills than a graduate. Some people have found that is the only way for them to get back to work. Some of the success stories have been people in the mid-40s to early-60s category.

Deputy Dara Calleary

I share Deputy Seán Kyne's concern about community welfare offices. This is fine on paper. Intreo is a great service, but if one does not have a car and does not live in Dublin one does not have a regular transport service. If a person is called for an interview but it costs €25 to €30 to get there in a taxi, he or she may not engage with the process. That is the danger. I fear that issue is not understood. The closure of community welfare offices and the withdrawal of the community welfare service are not understood and, specifically, given the location of Intreo offices, I fear the geography of rural Ireland is not understood.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I am well aware of the concerns raised by Deputy Calleary, which he has also raised with the Minister. I understand it was debated as a Topical Issue recently and there have been many parliamentary questions on the matter. I do not underestimate the concerns expressed by the Deputy. In my opening statement I referred to the fact that there must be a balance between what the Department does on the delivery, activation and control sides, all of which are of equal importance, but at times the balance shifts. Part of what we are talking about is a balance between delivery and activation and getting people back to work via enhanced training and engagement with them. As part of the Intreo service, there is a better service available which has certainly reduced in certain areas the work of the community welfare service.

On the question of geography, there is also the issue that some of the clinics that have been streamlined were literally open for an hour, if not less, per week, and people had to travel. We are looking at what is the most efficient use of the Department from a business point of view to provide a better service. Streamlining has been done in all divisions taking account of geography, public transport arrangements, etc., and what is available and done by the local divisional managers - for example, Mr. Carroll's equivalent in the Deputy's area, or wherever. They are people who know what they are talking about and, to be fair to them, know the geography and are trying to achieve a balance in what we are seeking to deliver. It is not only outside Dublin that we have difficulties; there are difficulties in Dublin also. Dublin Deputies are not necessarily happy with everything we are doing, but the principle and the criteria are providing a better service.

What happens in the case of a person who cannot attend the office? We may be able to do business with that person over the telephone or by e-mail. The community welfare service can respond in a difficult situation or crisis such as a flood event, and that will remain the case. This relates to the fundamental function of the community welfare service. I am aware there are discussions about it and people may have concerns in that area. If a person needs to be visited because he or she cannot attend an Intreo office or a local office, that will be arranged. The streamlining of services to provide a better service in order that the community welfare service can be open for longer hours, albeit in fewer locations, is happening throughout the country in consultation with former staff of the HSE and public representatives. We are engaging with public representatives about it and explaining it. I am aware that in Deputy Seán Kyne's area, the divisional manager, Mr. Carroll's equivalent, will attend a meeting arranged by the Deputy to bring people together to discuss the issue. The divisional manager will explain the plans. Is it all set in stone? It would be wrong to say that, because we have to review it.

When the community welfare service of the HSE came into the Department, there were 900 community welfare service clinics around the country. We have closed 260 of them. Some would have been open only for an hour here or an hour there. Now we have more business opening hours available to people. I am not saying it is perfect, and I am not saying we do not need to review it. The reason we are doing it is to provide a better service and to free up staff for activation and for the case officers. The Deputy looked at me earlier when I mentioned the number of case officers we have. We are trying to double the number, but that will not give us enough, as I said in my opening statement. We are looking at contracting out activation or employment services. We have to maintain a balance, we have to be agile and we have to look at the business. We have to see how the business can best meet people's needs, and that is what this is about.

Chairman

Does that cover all of Deputy Seán Kyne's questions?

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will ask Mr. McKeon to speak about the youth guarantee. The Deputy asked about the statement of mutual understanding and penalties. The bottom line comes down to rights and responsibilities. People have a right to a payment and a responsibility to engage. That will happen at one-on-one level and if the deciding officer is of the view that the person concerned is not properly engaging with us, for example, by not taking a training course or not participating, we will look at the imposition of penalty rates. Natural justice will be a part of this. In toto we have applied approximately 3,900 penalties . However, the purpose of penalties is not to penalise a person but to get him or her to engage with us. To be fair, engagement rates are now quite high.

Mr. John McKeon

As committee members probably know, the youth guarantee was agreed to in July during the Irish Presidency of the European Union. It is an agreement that the Heads of State and Government of Europe will work together to try to address the issue of youth unemployment, which is currently running from a level of approximately 22% to 23% around Europe. In Ireland it is 29% and in countries such as Spain and Greece possibly in excess of 60%, whereas in others such as Germany it is approximately 8% or 9%. These levels of unemployment mean that there are approximately 5.5 million young people between the ages of 16 and 24 years who are not at work, education and training. This represents a loss of productive capacity in Europe of a couple of percentage points of GDP. The proposal is that governments should work together to try to get to a situation where no young person would spend more than four months out of work without receiving an offer of further education, training or work. This is an ambitious objective and in recognition of this, the European Union has provided a fund of €6 billion across its member countries which are being asked to prepare implementation plans to bid for some of this money. We are in the process of preparing an implementation plan for Ireland which must be submitted by the end of December. A departmental group of senior officials is involved in preparing the plan supported by the OECD which we have engaged to help us draft it.

I caution against expecting that Ireland will receive a significant amount of money under the scheme because there is a precise formula for how much a country can receive, even with the best plan in the world. The amount to be allocated is related to the percentage of youth unemployment in the country and the number unemployed. We are hopeful we will receive some funding from the European Union, but we will not have the plan prepared until December when we will bring it to the Government for submission to the Union at the end of that month.

Deputy John Lyons

I thank the delegates for attending and congratulate the Department on establishing a labour market council or group which has already met and will oversee implementation of the revised strategy for 2013. I know the council has a good blend of people from industry who have experience of creating jobs and from the policy side who know all about unemployment.

I recognise there are limited resources within the Department of Social Protection and that it can only deal with the cards it has been dealt up to now. There is a process and an outcome. However, I have a concern that there is more of a focus in the Department - possibly because there are limited resources - on the outcome, in other words, getting somebody into a job, rather than on the process of engagement. If we really want to ensure people will not end up back on the live register, we need to spend time working with them on developing a career path in order that they can fend for themselves. We need to help them to discover their innate talents and improve on them. The current process of engagement does not allow this happen.

The committee was previously known as the Joint Committee on Jobs, Social Protection and Education and when all of these changes were happening in 2011, we suggested to the various Departments that career guidance should be a crucial element of any future labour activation measure being developed in so far as it was possible to do so within the limited resources available. However, the Department is not in a position to offer that essential element which would allow people to become independent and take charge of their career path. Much of the time, through no one's fault, there is no equality of focus between the process and the outcome. In some cases, we are putting people into jobs that will not suit them. As time passes, we will need to apply to the Exchequer for more resources to help us to focus more on the development of a career path because not enough is being spent in this area. I am not pointing the figure at anyone here. I recognise that the Department is doing what it can with the resources it has available, but both it and the Deputies present need to point out that if we are serious about reducing long-term unemployment and helping those who have recently become unemployed to ensure they will not return to Intreo offices, we must focus on allowing them to take the lead and give them the required skills. Unless we give them appropriate career guidance, we cannot do this.

My next question is related to the allocation of resources to various offices. To make an analogy, in the education area the DEIS programme allocates resources based on need to improve equality of outcomes in education. I suggest that formula might work at local level, as it would recognise that in various parts of the country there was a greater need or greater level of unemployment and that there was a need to focus on the unemployed in these areas. They are much further away from the labour market that they need more assistance. Is it recognised that some offices throughout the country deal not only with large numbers of unemployed persons but also with a number of people who will find it extremely difficult to find work because they are so far removed from employment? More work needs to be done with the people concerned. Does the Department recognise this and are resources allocated according to need? If not, should we not look at doing this? In other words, do Ballymun and Blackrock receive the same resources or is there a recognition that there may be different needs and different levels of need? Are resources pumped in according to need to give people the best chance possible to move a step nearer to finding a job?

In regard to the JobBridge programme, Mr. McKeon has mentioned the anecdotal evidence that people who are in their 40s or older find the programme a much better avenue in regard to labour market activation. It is great to hear this. Is there room for flexibility in the rules and regulations that might prohibit some people from taking up jobs, for example, in a case where somebody might have been employed by the company offering work previously, perhaps 20 years ago? Somebody in his or her 40s or 50s might have the opportunity to avail of an internship, but because he or she worked in a company previously, he or she might be prohibited from availing of it because of the rule about working with a previous employer. I do not want to get into the nuts and bolts of this issue, but is it possible local offices can be flexible or will whoever makes the decision recognise that some individuals may not fit within the rules and that if some discretion or flexibility is allowed, the person concerned will get the opportunity to become involved and work?

My final question is on the JobsPlus initiative. The following is one of the faults and failings of any of the initiatives that came before JobsPlus. By the way, JobsPlus is a really good initiative. What is the capacity of the Department of Social Protection to ensure that as many employers as possible know the ins and outs of the JobsPlus scheme, which is a much more streamlined system from which many employers could benefit? I say this in recognition of the fact that the Department is playing the cards it was dealt, does not have unlimited resources and is doing what it can. That is the basis on which I ask these questions.

This is not a finger-pointing exercise. I am genuinely concerned that the Department has gone through the biggest social reform ever in our history. The Department is doing what it can. No doubt it needs more resources. It is something about which I always argue here, although I do not hold the purse strings. If I could get some response to some of those, I would be fairly happy.

Chairman

It is a long list.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will ask Mr. McKeon and Mr. Carroll to help me out as we go along.

I am interested in what Deputy Lyons stated about the balance, as he sees it, between the outcome and the process of engagement. As I said, the intensity of engagement is all a work in progress. As I speak, we have a training programme for new case officers whom we are redeploying from other work within the Department.

The process of engagement is how we deal with individuals. I would like to think that our staff have great pride in how they deal with people and that they deal well with people. I hear the point Deputy Lyons is making as to how skilled and trained are they to do it, and with regard to career guidance. Just so I am clear, as this could be something of a language issue, the Department of Social Protection is not involved in career guidance as I would traditionally understand the term. What we are involved in is one-on-one engagement with people to see what are their skills and where they need training, and we try to refer them to what is most appropriate. In that regard, as I stated earlier, we work closely with employers. It is all local. If I were doing this in Ballymun, it would be different from doing it somewhere with a totally different catchment area. We are also involved with what are now the local education and training boards, ETBs. I would like to think that we are trying to improve our skills in the process of engagement through our own staff training and through the staff who came to us from FÁS who are skilled in this area, many of whom have formal qualifications in guidance.

The issue of outcomes goes to the core of whether it is a matter of placing people in any job and whether we merely want to place people in jobs, in which case they may come back because the jobs do not suit them. This is an engagement and it depends on the capabilities and characteristics of the individuals with whom we are dealing. We know that people have been placed in good jobs but have cycled back to our office, and it is not that they were placed in the wrong job but that they needed more support to stay in it. My colleagues feel strongly that as we engage more with those who are unfortunately long-term unemployed, the whole business of getting up and getting out, and doing it, will be more difficult for people. That is an area we certainly have to keep under review.

We are of the view that a job is better than no job, but we will not mismatch people totally, and that is what the engagement process is about. We have to be realistic as well with regard to the capabilities of the person and what he or she thinks he or she is suited for, and if there are employment prospects in that area. My colleagues in the Department of Education and Skills, in the ETBs and in SOLAS, which is about to be formed, are very much in this space as well and very much of the view that it is wrong to refer somebody to a training programme that he or she is not able for. There will be vetting in the ETBs in that regard. Therefore, I would say to Deputy Lyons that we are concerned.

The purpose of the probability of exit, PEX, profiling is that everybody gets treated the same, in the sense that it looks at one's individual characteristics. The process will be the same whether one turns up in the Ballymun Intreo office, the Dún Laoghaire Intreo office or the Limerick Intreo office. What I would say is that all offices are different in the sense that they are physically different and we are trying to get a model service within our physical structures. We have taken a pragmatic approach to this and we are working with the buildings we have, including our own former FÁS buildings.

The Deputy asked whether the resources were matched to the needs of the catchment areas. I would like to think that by and large the answer is "Yes," but my own staff tell me "No," and I need to get a better handle on that. For example, the largest local office that will be an Intreo office next year is Cork. It is our biggest office. It is too big. We need two offices in Cork to deliver a proper service. That is merely an example. We will do that and we will have that next year. That is merely an example of how we respond to issues in the catchment areas.

Different offices - such as the Ballymun office, with which Deputy Lyons is familiar, and the Finglas office - are well matched to the needs of their communities. As to whether they could be better, all offices could be better. As to whether the service could be better, of course it could, and that is what we are trying to work towards. As to whether there is some sort of other issue going on, I do not think so.

Deputy John Lyons

If I might reply to that, I suppose it is not about looking out for one's area or anything like that. No matter what geographical area a person is unemployed in, the DEIS model is merely a really good analogy. Are the resources allocated appropriately to the levels of deprivation in particular areas and, if not, can we look towards doing that? If, for example, I am teaching in a school where there are children who are not even able to read and write and I am supposed to compete on outcomes at the same level with another school, I am merely asking if the Department of Social Protection could possibly think about it a little more and maybe come back with some sort of allocation of resources based on criteria identified to match the needs of the black spot that the area may be, irrespective of the part of the country it is in.

Chairman

I presume Deputy Lyons means not only the volume but the type of resource as well.

Deputy John Lyons

To a certain extent, it is volume and the amount of time that it is necessary to spend. It is a complex formula or equation that needs to be developed to recognise the uneven distribution of unemployment and the type and scale of that unemployment. It is a matter of how we engage with the individual. There are some who may need more time. There may be many in a particular area who need more time because they are so far removed from the labour market, yet there will be other areas where not as much effort is needed to engage with the unemployed. All I am asking is whether the second office gets the same resources as the other office.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will ask Mr. Carroll to say something to illustrate this. I stated earlier that all of this will work at the local level. I am conscious that it has to work at the local level, and different local areas are different by definition, be it due to their catchment areas or their employers. However, I would say that the use of profiling and engagement is to target those who are in most need and are most disadvantaged.

It is very clear that the focus of Pathways to Work 2013 is on the long-term unemployed.

The numbers on the register are reflected, broadly speaking, in the location of offices. My colleague Mr. Paul Carroll will speak about some initiatives in his division, particularly the initiative with NALA.

Mr. Paul Carroll

As we speak, there is no definitive mapping or equitable distribution of resources according to need. What we have been doing and will continue to do in the Department is to look at that issue, try to map it and to have equitable resources across offices and across divisions. As Ms Vaughan mentioned earlier, we are in the process of doubling the number of case officers. What my colleagues and I did at divisional level was to consider where the case officers should be located. As we look at the reconfiguration of services, we are trying to increase the complement of case officers in the areas that have fewer case officers per thousand on the live register. The old social welfare offices were staffed relative to the live register. The then FÁS staff were distributed in accordance with the range of services it provided, as was the community welfare service. Each of those services inherently mapped service provision around need in the area. We now have the opportunity to reconfigure services to release people. In my own division I will be redeploying staff from one area into Coolock, Finglas and Swords. I was asked if the number of staff in Ballymun would be the same as the number in Blackrock. Ballymun, as the area of most disadvantage in my division, currently has by far the greatest proportion of activation resources per head of population compared to anywhere else in my division. That is not just in terms of staff from the Department of Social Protection, but staff in the local employment services, with whom we work closely.

Deputy John Lyons

It is really good to hear that.

Mr. Paul Carroll

We are increasingly looking at the distribution of staff in the areas of most disadvantage. The next stage is to look at the divisional structure. I know my boss will be coming back to me in the not too distant future on whether we might be able to help out colleagues in other divisions. We are very conscious of resources.

Deputy John Lyons

I raised questions on JobsPlus and the possibility of flexibility at local level around the JobBridge scheme.

Ms Anne Vaughan

Mr. McKeon has just reminded me that the local employment services are very much in areas of greater deprivation. The contracting-out model that we are looking at will be examining areas of particular need. That will also be part of the rebalancing of the service.

Mr. John McKeon

JobBridge is probably the most flexible scheme in the Department and we try to operate it flexibly. If there are particular circumstances, Deputy Lyons can raise them with me directly or with the JobBridge team and they will look at them. There is a rule that people cannot move out of employment into an internship with that employer. However, if there has been a period of no employment, we can look at that flexibly. If the last period of employment was only six weeks previously we would have questions. We take a pragmatic approach.

The take-up of the JobsPlus has been quite positive compared to the previous PRSI scheme, in which the take-up was quite low. We are working very closely with groups such as Chambers Ireland and IBEC to promote the scheme. Since July we have had 16 different breakfast briefings with employer groups and representatives. We have been trying to promote the scheme through the employer representative bodies. We think there is greater awareness and knowledge of the scheme. We are obviously promoting JobsPlus to jobseekers as well, and that will feed back to employers. If the demand for the JobsPlus remains at the level it is currently running at, which is roughly three times the demand for the PRSI scheme, we would be there or thereabouts. If demand began to dip, we would look at it again.

Deputy John Lyons

Thank you.

Deputy Áine Collins

I welcome the delegation and thank them for the information pack. In common with Deputy Lyons, I have come across cases in which people aged 50-plus got back into work through the internship and have created jobs for themselves. I have seen and heard about these cases on the ground.

It is proposed to double the number of activation officers to 600. I came across a problem in Charleville that was caused when the activation officer who used to come to the town one day a month was moved from Mallow to the Limerick office. The Limerick office was not able to provide the activation officer and Charleville has been without an activation officer for the past two to three months. The situation has not been resolved. Will the delegation look into that for me? I have not been able to get an answer from the local office.

Is everybody in receipt of a payment from the Department of Social Protection on a database? Can I ring and find out how many people are unemployed in Cork north-west and what their skills sets are?

Ms Anne Vaughan

Yes.

Deputy Áine Collins

I can? I will get an answer.

The Tús scheme is a 12-month programme in which people from the live register are picked at random to participate. Their skills are matched to work that would benefit them, and if they have a particular preference they get an opportunity to work in that area. The matching process has not been the greatest. People are pushed into jobs for which they are neither suitable nor capable, be it physically or mentally or for one or the other reason. I wonder how that scheme is evaluated. A proposal to extend the Tús scheme for a second year was discussed. Has there been any development on that proposal?

Ms Anne Vaughan

The short answer to the Deputy's first question on Charleville is that I do not know, but I will check it out and get back to her.

Deputy Áine Collins

That will be great. It is a significant issue in the area.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will see what the story is and then I will get back to the Deputy.

In response to the question on the database, the short answer is "Yes," but the system is clunky. If one allows for the fact that three organisations came together with their own databases and their own ICT systems, one can see it is not seamless. In terms of providing a service to local employers, Mr. McKeon referred to job fairs and Mr. Connolly is running these out in Dublin north. I am sure there is something similar in the Deputy's own area. We are mining the systems and we are working with employers. We are working with large employers and local employers to find the people with the skill sets that are required. It is a work in progress, as is much of the work on transformation to better, more streamlined services.

From the point of view of whether an employer can get what he or she is looking for, the short answer is "Yes." It might take us time, but if an employer is looking for a particular type for interview, we would be able to do that for him or her.

Deputy Áine Collins

When we negotiate with the IDA about companies locating in the regions, it comes back with questions about the skills in the area. Obviously not all people are on the live register and there may be people with particular skills sets who are working. It would be an added service to have the skill sets identified. I know I came across this when I was looking in my own area. I could not get the information I needed. That was two years ago.

Ms Anne Vaughan

My own sense is that we are trying to use our own databases and to mine them as much as possible. There is quite a lot of data out there at regional and local level. That is what we need to work with. Our agencies are trying to work on the information also.

The purpose of Tús is twofold. That is why selection is random. I referred to the three functions of the Department, one of which is control. This is random because we want people who are on the live register, saying they are available for work, to take the work.

I would accept that at the edges people are possibly not best matched, but I come back to what I was saying to Deputy John Lyons, that a job - a change of routine - is good for people. That is what we are trying to push in the activation programme. We must be upfront and say this. Certainly, it is a control. People say they are available and then they are selected.

Deputy Áine Collins

That is valid, but I have concerns. The delivery of this service is being outsourced in many communities and when people are picked, they might not be matched with what suits them best. I came across a situation where what had happened put somebody back. I reported this, but nothing happened. I am concerned about the controls.

Ms Anne Vaughan

If the Deputy has particular concerns, we will certainly have a look at them. It must all be dealt with locally. We have too many schemes and they all came to us in different ways, through various amalgamations, and the plan is to have a simpler structure. That is no secret. We published our review of activation schemes last year and the plan is to have schemes that are focused in the activation space and more in the social services space because we recognise that it is not possible in all schemes to have progression at the level we would like, be it for geographical or other reasons. We are quite keen to differentiate. Within the community employment scheme, my colleagues are looking at particular strands or programmes. An obvious strand would be drugs schemes leading to a different type of progression such as trying to get started. As we are trying to look at all of these, we are open to receiving any feedback the committee might have.

Deputy Michael Conaghan

I welcome the delegation. I would like to remark on the work it does and the value of that work. Moving someone closer to work is probably one of the most important interventions that can be made in someone's life. It takes staff to do such work, as I would like to acknowledge. My second remark is about the scale of the transformation of services. When we think about how State services work, we often have this caricature of a very slow moving process in which it takes years to do things. It strikes me on the service the Department has reconfigured and transformed that it happened very quickly and without a great deal of fuss, without the things that can happen when people are asked to change roles, positions and so on. It is worth pointing out that something like that can be done, especially in the context of the collapse of the economy and the tsunami which left people left high and dry without work. All of this has not been noted properly.

Where is the Department in a European context? Has it moved closer or further away from what is considered to be the most humane model of social protection in Europe, the so-called Scandinavian model? Have we moved closer to the English model of activation or intervention? What is Ms Vaughan's ideal in this regard?

Deputy Anthony Lawlor

I thank the delegation for coming and welcome the opportunity to ask some questions. Will Ms Vaughan provide a list of Intreo offices being proposed? In County Kildare what is happening can be described as retro rather than Intreo because we are going from having one stop to four or five, particularly in Newbridge where we still do not have a single unit. What contact does the Department have with the OPW? It seems strange that a different agency is finding facilities for another Department. Is there any truth in the rumour that the Newbridge Credit Union building will be used as the Intreo facility?

Members have spoken about the suitability of persons for various FÁS courses. I know of a number of people who have been placed on courses, even though they were not suitable. How do we make sure people undertake courses that are suitable for them? What percentage of those on FÁS courses are subsequently employed in positions related to the courses they have undertaken? I have discovered that people who want to do something particular start the Pathways to Work programme, but there are no courses available for them. Does the Department intend to do anything about this? How does it reduce social welfare payments to individuals when there is no interaction with social welfare offices? What is the figure in that regard? How is it proposed to step down their social welfare income?

Ms Anne Vaughan

I welcome Deputy Michael Conaghan's remarks. It is perhaps not fully understood, but when stuff is progressing and there are difficulties, one can see the scale of what is happening. The Croke Park agreement facilitated some of what we were able to do, while the staff of the three organisations involved facilitated the change. Having said that, Mr. McKeown headed up the IR negotiations and it was not a small or simple piece of work, but there was agreement. I learned that there was agreement at every level to have a focus on providing a better customer service and that is what drove people forward. That was the prize and we were able to fix issues as we moved along.

We like to have our Irish model of social protection, which is the best of everything. In preparing for the Intreo service we looked at the arrangements in other countries. We have a long way to go to reach a Scandinavian model and much of it comes back to the fact that it is a totally different system. The rates of social insurance paid are totally different, as are the benefits. Everything is different, but we are looking at what works in other countries.

We obviously view a lot of the developments in the UK, the EU, Australia and further afield. Certainly, in terms of contracting out, we have looked at what has been going on in countries that have been doing this for many decades. There is an advantage in coming to this later than perhaps we should have. That is just by way of explanation.

Deputy Lawlor referred to Newbridge and he knows better than I that the situation there is very difficult. I said earlier that we are trying to make Intreo work. Ideally, we would like the Intreo service to be in one physical location because that works best. However, that is not possible in many of our locations and we are going to have to make it fit in whatever way we are configured. However, it is a particular challenge in Newbridge, as I am aware.

The OPW is the body that sources accommodation for us and enables our accommodation to be fitted out, re-kitted and so on. We and the OPW are working hard on the Intreo programme in order to achieve the establishment of more than 40 Intreo offices at the end of this year. While that is very challenging, it remains the target, and the OPW is confident it can reach that target. We can supply the committee with a list of the offices that are already Intreo or are to be Intreo-ed this year and next year. The plan is to finish by the end of next year. I can separately supply the secretariat with that, if it suits. I do not particularly want to say much more about Newbridge at this point. There are a lot of issues there and I am well aware of them. We and the OPW are doing our best.

With regard to FÁS and the check-backs, I made some reference to this issue earlier. We are working on this as we move forward with the ETBs. People need to be selected for courses and training for which they are suitable. As I said to Deputy Lyons, support needs to be given to people who have been longer out of the workforce. There is a check-back. People who have been placed in jobs have come back into the office and we are aware of that. People are spoken to again by the case officer to see why they did not stick it out. As I said earlier, my education colleagues are very much of the view that people need to be vetted for certain training courses to make sure they are suitable for them. I hope that will improve the situation.

I am not sure what progression data I have available. I suspect we do not have it on FÁS courses as such.

Mr. John McKeon

There is some data on FÁS courses. While I do not know the exact figure, the progression rate into employment is 40%-plus. It is not as high as that of JobBridge, which is 60%-plus, but 40%-plus is relatively high. We can get the most up-to-date information and circulate it to the committee afterwards.

Ms Anne Vaughan

The Deputy also asked about the situation in which an Intreo office is looking for ETB or FÁS courses but they are not available. That is the whole purpose of the change in the ETBs and in SOLAS, in terms of looking at what is required from a national perspective but also, as I said, on the ground. If, for example, the staff in one of Mr. Carroll's offices in Dublin north feel there is a need for a particular course because there is a particular employer that can provide jobs, then Mr. Carroll will be talking to the ETB in Dublin city to see what is available.

Deputy Anthony Lawlor

That means an office would put people on courses based on the jobs that might be available near its location rather than putting them on courses related to jobs they may have had before or that would allow them to improve their base skills.

Mr. Paul Carroll

What we have attempted over the last few years is to engage with employers to find out what the real opportunities are, both locally and at a national level, so that we know where the growing employment areas are. In terms of the specific progression measures we agree with an individual, that is really a function of the interview that takes place. It may well be that somebody is in fact highly skilled and job-ready, despite having lost a job. No course would be required in that instance; what is required is perhaps assistance in polishing his or her interview skills. In looking at the range of service provision in an area, one of the first things we do is to map the service provision, in that a case officer maps the totality of opportunities available in an area. For example, in Swords and Balbriggan we found there was no jobs club. There were people who were highly skilled but were failing at interview, so we recognised the need for a jobs club and we have worked towards the development of a new model of a week-long jobs club.

We recognise that some of the courses were not suitable, or if they were suitable for some, there were gaps in service provision. We have liaised with FÁS, the ETBs and the partnerships to fill those gaps. Again, if I was to talk about Swords and Balbriggan - this does tend to happen at local level - the area manager engaged with the manager of the FÁS centre in Baldoyle and agreed the development of a six-week career planning course. There were people who simply did not know what they wanted to do. Rather than refer them on to a long course that they might find halfway through was not suitable, we now have this six-week career planning course. Again, there was a recognition that there was a gap in service provision for young people, so my staff are in discussions with FÁS and they have finally agreed on a basic skills foundation course, again for six weeks, that FÁS will roll out next year.

We were engaging with a fairly large employer who had a number of opportunities in the security industry, and we hosted a major event for him by drafting in 500 people with security skills. On foot of that day, 60 people got jobs on the spot. He is an employer who operates nationwide and we act as an account manager for him so, for example, when he was in a position to say he had 35 jobs in Cork and 35 in Waterford, and asked whether we could help him, one of my staff, acting as an account manager, liaised with colleagues in Waterford and Cork. Having used our databases to identify everybody in the division - that is, the 500 people in the division who had some kind of security-related qualification or skill - we found that not all of them were suitable for those jobs, because the employer had a range of jobs available at the upper end of the scale, where higher industry standards were required. Again, we sat down with FÁS, which has agreed as part of its programme for contracted training for 2014 that it will provide a security skills course. While it is not necessarily for that employer, that employer has had an involvement in terms of course design because there are jobs available.

It is difficult to speak on a very general basis. There might be people with a range of skills but we would not have the same intervention for all of those people. For example, Deputy Lyons might require a jobs club to just polish his skills, whereas somebody else cannot read or write. That is why we are engaging with the National Adult Literacy Agency to come up with strategies to deal more effectively with people who have literacy or numeracy issues. To talk again about Swords and Balbriggan on an area basis, there are significant numbers of non-nationals there with English language difficulties. We have sat down with the Fingal Leader partnership company and it now provides English language assessment courses for people, and the City of Dublin VECs provide further training thereafter. It is a multidisciplinary approach based on ascertaining what the needs are, what the skills base is locally and what jobs are available both locally and nationally, and then trying to bridge that gap to engage with other service providers.

Ms Anne Vaughan

All of what Mr. Carroll describes is what his other 12 divisional managers and their staff are doing around the country. This sort of activity is happening very much at the local level.

Deputy Anthony Lawlor

Could we have a list of the divisional managers? It might be important to refer to them.

Ms Anne Vaughan

Absolutely. The Deputy's final question referred to the penalty rates of payment where we reduce people's payments.

Overall - this is the cumulative total - more than 3,900 people have had a penalty applied to them and, since the start of the year, more than 2,000 have had a penalty applied. As I mentioned, the trick is to get people to engage and, by doing so, get them off the penalty.

Deputy Anthony Lawlor

How much is the penalty? Is it around €20?

Ms Anne Vaughan

The penalty is a reduction of €44 in the personal rate of payments. If I were in receipt of a payment for me, my spouse and children, the deduction would be made purely in the personal rate of payment.

Senator David Cullinane

I apologise for missing the presentations. I had a speaking engagement in the Seanad and could not attend. I welcome the delegation to the committee which published a report a number of weeks ago entitled, Southeast Economic Development Strategy 2013-2023. It made a number of recommendations for the south east, although it would be logical to apply some of these across the State. Some of them might be of interest to the delegates because they relate to their Department.

We consulted across the south east. We met SOLAS, people who worked in the VECs, the colleges of further education, the institutes of technology and so on. One thing that concerned almost everybody working in the sphere was that the area was in a state of flux. There might, therefore, be a need for awareness-raising campaigns on what the new bodies do, especially the education and training boards and the Intreo offices, and the services they provide. That is something for the Department to look at, with the many other proposals made.

It is important to say action is required and that we need to support the creation of full-time employment. There is a risk in blaming the unemployed for the lack of opportunities. It is regrettable that I sometimes hear in political discourse and beyond that people who are unemployed are responsible because they are not looking for work and so on. We must recognise the scale of unemployment and emigration and the lack of job creation and see the issue in that context.

I want to hear the delegates' views on a number of points. The first is on the success of the various measures. We want to benchmark success. How are all of the labour activation measures and programmes working and impacting on people's lives? What percentage of those going through the activation measures will find work? What is the difference between the schemes? What percentage of those on JobsBridge, Tús and FÁS training schemes enter full-time employment?

There is also the matter of interaction with Government priorities. If one looks at the Government's focus on hi-tech and export-led firms, what are relations like between IDA Ireland-sponsored companies, for example? How many of these are involved in job activation? How many people find employment in IDA Ireland-supported companies? When IDA Ireland-supported companies make an announcement, has the Department put in place, for example, pre-employment training programmes for the long-term unemployed? Do they fit the needs of companies? An issue that arose strongly in the consultations in the south east was the need to ensure labour activation measures also extended to people furthest away from the jobs market.

There were also interesting observations from NALA, National Adult Literacy Agency, on people's numeracy and literacy skills and how we sometimes did not integrate these areas into labour activation measures. We need to ensure at all times that we reach out to the greatest breadth of people who need supports.

Issues were raised about PRSI and part-time workers. Can we have details about the success of incentivising employees to take up work, including the breakdown by part-time and full-time work? It was mentioned that the PRSI scheme provided a perverse incentive for employers to break full-time work into part-time work. That matter has been discussed by the committee a number of times. Is it a problem? How is the Department looking at the issue?

We also need to look more at apprenticeships. We have taken a particular view of them that has not been all that good. However, if one looks at what Germany and other countries do, one will see that they are an awful lot better at it because apprenticeships are seen to be workable, not only for manufacturing but also IT and all sorts of different areas. Is the Department looking at this issue, too?

I appreciate that the delegates may not have information on all the questions I have asked; therefore, they might be able to send it on after the meeting.

Ms Anne Vaughan

It would be extremely helpful to look at the committee's report and we will do so. I was aware of the report, but I have not yet looked at it in detail.

Senator David Cullinane is right. There are many new bodies and approaches. There is also the transformation of both our part and the education part of the business. I know that divisional managers are, as Intreo offices come on side, organising various information sessions locally to bring various groups together, including employers, and for jobs fairs, which is good. I have mentioned that all of this will work if it works locally, which is important, regardless of whether it applies to a city, a town or a rural area.

The Senator made a point about the differences between schemes. I have mentioned the fact that we have too many schemes. We need to streamline them, as we are doing. A review was carried out last year of the various activation schemes-----

Senator David Cullinane

As an aside, an issue about which service providers feel strongly is that the greater the collaboration between some of the schemes, the more we can get from them. Sometimes there is not that collaboration.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I accept that and that would be seen easily locally. I presume the committee's report touched on that issue, too.

On IDA Ireland companies and employers and what has been brought into regions, that is a space we are getting into. Our area and divisional managers meet local enterprise groups and IDA Ireland; therefore, we are joined up. We are clear that the Department of Social Protection is very much looking at the supply side. Obviously, the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and all of its agencies are looking at the demand side and the two must come together and take into account the fact that it is people about whom we are talking.

On what is happening and how we can gear up better, it cannot all be about the Department of Social Protection. It is very much in the space of SOLAS, the ETBs and the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation. If one looks at Pathways to Work 2013, all these Departments and agencies are involved and have individual and grouped responsibilities; therefore, we must prepare on that basis. I accept the Senator's points in that regard.

Late last week I met NALA and discussed both issues at a policy, strategic and individual level. As it happens, work is being done in some of Mr. Carroll's offices with NALA and it is quite satisfied in that space.

I will ask Mr. McKeon to say a little about apprenticeships and the success of the measures taken. It is probably too early to talk about whether Intreo is a success. Apprenticeships which are with FÁS come under the new ETBs and SOLAS. I am aware from my colleagues in the Department of Education and Skills that a review is under way which will report by the end of the year. In fact, apprenticeships and traineeships are being reviewed. Mr. Duffy is chairing the review of apprenticeships; therefore, that issue is very much on the radar.

What members are seeing, in the very fact that the Department of Social Protection is rightly reporting to the committee, is a joined-up approach in jobs, education and social welfare payments.

Mr. John McKeon

In regard to the success of the measures, as Ms Vaughan said, it is probably too early to say whether the Intreo approach to the process of group engagement, early engagement, one-to-one profiling is delivering over and above other approaches. We started to roll out the approach only last October and currently we have 15 offices live out of 60. It takes some time working in any office to try to assess it properly. We have set ourselves some targets and performance against those targets. It is in the pack circulated to the committee. We set targets against, for example, moving people from long-term unemployment into employment. When we set the target the run rate at that stage would have been that 37,500 people would have moved out of long-term unemployment to employment. We set a target doubling that number to 75,000 and we are on track to reach that target. We set ourselves a target on reducing the persistence rate, that is, the rate at which people who are short-term unemployed continue into long-term unemployment. We are on track with that target. Similarly, we set a target to increase the exit rates of people who are long-term unemployed. In aggregate, they are targets which will measure the overall impact. We set ourselves what, I believe, are ambitious targets on each of those relative to performance and we are on track with them. There are some where we are not on track. They are mainly input measures such as the number of people on scheme places and so on.

With regard to the progression rates, the most recent evaluation we have had done of any scheme is of JobBridge. We commissioned a report by Indecon Economic Consultants, a specialist consultancy firm. It tendered for and won the contract. It does much work for various governments, not just the Irish Government. It estimated that the progression rate into employment is 61%, which is about double the European average for such schemes. It appears to be working well.

In regard to the PRSI incentive scheme, members will probably be aware we have changed it to the JobsPlus scheme which commenced in July. Initial indications are that it is working well. There is a lower rate of PRSI for salaries up to a certain level. I think that is what was meant by the reference to person centred. That is a difficult one to judge. Certainly there would be some who argue, for example, in Germany that it is better to have two people doing one job, rather than one person doing one job. In other words, two people are taken out of unemployment. The European Union would push that line. Whether one considers it to be a perverse incentive or a correct incentive, I am not sure that it is an incentive at all. There is no real hard evidence that employers are deliberately cutting salaries off at a certain level. I cannot see it and I have looked at the numbers.

On the apprenticeship issue, a review of apprenticeships is being undertaken by the Department of Education and Skills. It is certainly looking at the German model as being one issue. In respect of the German model, which has been much quoted, it is important to be aware that it has been in place since the 18th century and has to do with guilds and chambers of commerce and is very much a tripartite relationship between employers, the public sector and trade unions in towns and villages. That is the construct for it. It is also based on streaming people at 14 and 15 years of age into either vocational education or into education which ultimately leads to the third level stream. In Ireland, certainly in the past, we took a decision to move into the third level type stream. As a personal aside, it would be a very brave person who would tell the mammies and daddies of Ireland that their children are not going to university, that they are going the vocational route instead. That is what is done in Germany. It is a serious issue and one that should be looked at and, obviously, the Department of Education and Skills is looking at it.

Chairman

I have a couple of questions but I will go through them quickly. In the original Pathways to Work the aims were hope and we all had great hopes and ambitions. In 2013 it is coming together. It was a little sluggish along the way because of delays with offices and so on but, in fairness, as other members have said, the service is kicking in now. I think we have always believed in it. It is a matter of rolling it out to as many as possible as quickly as possible. I know the witnesses share this view.

There is a delay with the offices which I understand from the Minister has to do with getting offices in some cases or getting them kitted out. Is there anything we can do to move that along? It appears strange given the availability of so much office space that we cannot do anything in the short term to fill the gap. The Intreo service is great. It would be nice to have it available everywhere. I know there are plans for 2014 but it would be good to get there as quickly as possible. Is there anything we can do on that issue?

During the initial crash when numbers increased dramatically, there were probably times when, due to various reasons, the engagement between the client and staff did not work out and some people did not have great experiences. There will always be cases of that in any service. I have come across people who have an opinion of the service or an opinion of the various policies and they are out of date. Is there anything we can do to target people on our list and let them know that the service has changed or the options have changed, that it is easier to take on part-time work and go off the social welfare payment and go back on it. That message is out there. I still come across people who have turned down work because they say it will take ages to get back on social welfare. However, it does not. In fairness to the witnesses, that is corrected, but that message is not out there. Perhaps in the engagement with clients it may be possible to get a simple straight-forward letter setting out the update on what is available and the options. It could probably be targeted at those who are in the system a long time.

I turn to case workers. I appreciate there has been much movement of staff in the Department, the majority of whom I compliment. The overwhelming majority have adapted but there are always a few who have not adapted and we have to let the witnesses know about them when we come across them. What type of training is provided for case workers? They are into career guidance at this stage. Do they get much guidance or retraining? The work they do is a delicate operation when trying to advise a person on a career, where he or she will go and so on. In the actions for the year ahead, the witnesses mentioned contracting more additional capacity. Is that in the case managers, career guidance, or profiling? Where is it hoped to used the additional capacity? How soon will that happen? I am aware the capacity needed is not available. What areas is it intended to target with the additional capacity from the private sector?

There was also a question on course adaption. The Department is engaging with others to adapt courses. It is great to see that.

We often speak here about having common sense. An issue that has arisen a few times is the back-to-education allowance and the various rules that apply. Are there any plans to examine the rules. The one that has come to light this year is that one has to be out of the education system for two years. There are other rules relating to how long one is out of work. I have a couple of clients who, for whatever reason, got mixed advice but they are now in colleges and on a place. They have been told they will not qualify for it because of the rules and yet they will leave that college course for this year and go back on jobseeker's. There is no difference in the cost to the Department but because they do not tick the box they will leave the college course. I have a couple of cases and I know others have cases also. Is there a little bit of scope to do something given that it is cost neutral? I thought at this stage we could adapt the rules if the need arose, when it was obvious and common sense applied. I am told by people on the front line in the service that this is quite common. Sometimes it is due to a mix up. I accept they may have enrolled incorrectly in the course but perhaps some way of resolving the issue could be looked at.

There are still differences in the service across the country. I am aware of the number of offices in operation and the number of staff involved. It would be ideal if we could have the same standard of service everywhere. I appreciate due to office layout and various pressures that is not always possible. We should soon be at the stage where the level of service is the same everywhere. I do not mean the roll-out of Intreo but the service in general. I still come across cases around the country where the staff at the front line are not up to date on basic information they should have. They are then not in a position to pass it on to somebody. There are people who, on their first engagement with the service, do not get the best information. That should not happen given all the new equipment available. There are many good schemes in place. The staff at the front line need to know them and need to talk about them and sell them if possible. I acknowledge they are posted on the walls and available to read. I am conscious that some clients cannot follow the poster or cannot read it. We should always be at the point of sale. If one goes into a bank one is always asked if one wants to buy insurance. It is constantly trying to sell something to customers. We probably need to get to that stage with our staff, where they will ask clients, "Do you know of..." and keep pressing it.

Mr. McKeon engaged a great deal with JobBridge.

It seems to be a very adaptable scheme and the feedback so far seems to be very positive. However, some employers have told me that they are coming across a lot of graduates in interviews who, on principle, will not sign on. They will not claim social welfare for three or four months and therefore cannot avail of the scheme. I know that the Department must deal with the people before it and can only work with those who are on the list. However, there are people out there who will just not sign on and there is a danger that they will fall through the cracks. Graduates coming out of college will miss out on the potential for work experience because they have not been signing on for three months. A number of employers have raised this issue with me but I am not sure if there is a solution to it. I am simply bringing the issue to the attention of the witnesses, who may have come across this problem themselves.

Representatives of the Crafts Council of Ireland appeared before this committee on a number of occasions in the last 12 months. The council told us that it was engaging with the Department to determine whether the rules of JobBridge could be adjusted to make allowances for the circumstances of its members, many of which do not employ anyone else. Has any progress been made on that issue? Was a solution found?

This committee drew up a report last year on youth unemployment, which was sent to the Department. The part-time job initiative that was run by the Department in the early 1990s was flagged as a very successful programme. Has that been considered for reintroduction? My understanding is that a person was given a limited number of hours' work in a given area and would continue to be paid his or her social welfare entitlement while receiving an hourly rate of pay. It was cost-neutral from the Exchequer's point of view, but the individual concerned received valuable work experience and was closer to the job market. It was not unlike some of the schemes currently in place. That might be one to reconsider. The feedback this committee received suggested that it was a very successful scheme. I was still in school at the time of its operation but judging from the feedback we received, it was very good. I ask the witnesses for their thoughts on that.

Ms Anne Vaughan

I will respond to some of the Chairman's questions and Mr. John McKeon will take the remainder.

On the question of Intreo being sluggish, I accept that criticism. Nobody is as frustrated about that as the Minister and the Department. It is sometimes hard to know why things take so long but, to be fair, in some instances planning permission, fire certificates and refurbishment are required, all of which take time. I do not think there is anything this committee can do to speed up the process. The OPW has said it will have the 43 centres by the end of the year. As I said earlier, that is very ambitious, but it is what we are working towards. There is work for both the OPW and ourselves to do in this regard. In my opening statement and the accompanying information pack we outline what will be required to get us to the full Intreo service, but all offices have been touched by significant elements of the Intreo service already. It is not a black-or-white scenario. We will have to determine where we are at the end of the year. We are very conscious that many of the Intreo offices are scheduled to come on stream in the last month of 2013, which is challenging in itself. We will assess the situation again at the end of the year. There is no lack of will on our part or that of the OPW but I take the point the Chairman made. This is something the Minister raises with us regularly. She asks about buildings, why there are delays and so forth. She is looking for an increased pace in this area.

The Chairman raised a number of points regarding customer service. One of the things our staff pride themselves on is good engagement. However, I accept that there can be pockets or instances of poor customer service, to which the Chairman has drawn our attention. We will examine the points raised, but with 7,000 staff, it is not always going to be perfect. All working conditions are not ideal either, it must be said.

It is many years since I was before Deputy English when he was Chairman of another committee and we discussed the issue of people being concerned that they would be in a long queue to receive their social welfare payments again if they took up temporary work. We tell people that this is no longer the case, but they must tell us in advance. We suspend claims now when people take up short-term jobs. This is especially relevant in the lead-up to Christmas. It is important that people tell us they are taking up such posts, but I accept the point made by the Chairman. He is not the only public representative who has told us that this is causing difficulties. We have tried to do a lot in that space, but we will do more if necessary.

We have a very intensive training course for case workers. We have just finished a pilot of the course, which went quite well, and Mr. McKeon will elaborate further on that. However, I must repeat what I said to Deputy Lyons earlier, namely, that we do not see ourselves getting involved in career guidance as such. We see our role as a directive one. Perhaps we are speaking the same language on this.

Chairman

Is it the job of the Department to help people to access some of the opportunities that are available?

Ms Anne Vaughan

Absolutely, yes.

Chairman

The Department is not there to pick careers for people-----

Ms Anne Vaughan

Correct. The Department's role is to try to place people in jobs. Our case officers pause matters when a person is trying to improve their skills, retrain or develop new skills in an area in which there are no jobs. We are quite clear in this. Our colleagues in the education space may take a different perspective on the value of education but we are very much focused on jobs and the live register.

Mr. McKeon will deal in more detail with the contracting-out proposals. It will take us until some time next year to get people and services on board. Again, the focus will be in the long-term space. Indeed, all of our efforts are in the long-term space.

To return to the question of education, it formed part of the review of the various activation schemes that we undertook. It would probably be best if we analysed the particular cases to which the Chairman referred. The plan now is that the placing of people on all schemes, including the back-to-education scheme and the CE programme, will be done through case officers. It will not be a case of people going off and matching themselves up to various schemes. They will not be able to do that.

The Intreo service should be the same regardless of the physical appearance of individual offices. To be fair, if I am delivering Intreo over two offices, it is slightly more tricky than delivering it over one. I know there are difficulties in the Chairman's own area in terms of trying to secure accommodation. The front-line staff are very much up for this and are very customer-focused. I could not say enough for them. The situation is difficult.

I will ask Mr. McKeon to address the questions about JobBridge. The Chairman is correct that there was a part-time job incentive scheme. It formed part of our review and it will be part of the future plan, which will be based on fewer schemes and building on the success of what we have. We must try not to confuse people too much with too many offerings. We must strike a balance between being agile in responding to what is needed and being fair to people.

Mr. John McKeon

In response to the particular question on the Crafts Council of Ireland, I can confirm that we have sorted that issue out. A scheme is now running with the council. Indeed, there is a similar scheme running in the arts community, with local authority involvement. The issue that arose in that context was determining the actual host organisation. It was addressed by deeming the Arts Council and local authorities to be host organisations. In that way, we can support the arts and the crafts sectors in accessing interns.

Chairman

What about the question of graduates who do not want to sign on after leaving college?

Mr. John McKeon

That is a very difficult issue. A number of committee members have made reference to the scarcity of resources, staff and scheme places. We have 408,000 people who are signing on. If people do not sign on, it is very difficult to say they should get a place over and above those who are signing on. Another practical difficulty is that many of the schemes come with payments attached. If an individual is not on a payment, he or she cannot receive the top-up. That presents a very practical difficulty.

Chairman

In that case, people should just bite the bullet and sign on. In terms of the information that is available, many people do not realise that it is relatively easy to sign off and then sign back on again. Furthermore, in many cases, when people take up employment they are allowed to keep their medical cards. Every day of the week I meet people who tell me they will lose their medical cards if they take up a job. I tell them that is incorrect.

Ms Anne Vaughan

Yes; a person can keep the medical card for three years.

Chairman

Yes, but that message is not out there. People just do not know about that. It is a common misconception that people will lose their medical cards.

My last question is on the housing assistance payment. I know that January is the target for that.

Is it still on target?

Ms Anne Vaughan

Yes.

Chairman

This is going to have implications for other payments. It will need to be publicised in advance.

Ms Anne Vaughan

Exactly. This is between ourselves and the main players, the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. There is much work to be done in this area. The housing assistance payment is an environment Department scheme. If we can, our Department will be facilitating payment of it.

Mr. John McKeon

One of the actions under Pathways to Work was to deliver a better-off-in-work statement to people at their initial one-to-one guidance interview. We have changed tack a little on that. We have developed an online tool that will be available at the end of the month which is a ready reckoner. It will show recipients the comparative earnings if they take on a job, say, for 30 hours a week on the minimum wage. While it will not be precise for every individual as it will not include other points of information such as tax, it will give them a good idea of how better off they would be working.

We have noted group engagement is seen positively. I know of people who were unemployed in the 1980s and lost their job again in this recession. They tell me group engagement gives them all information on social welfare payments and it reassures them they are not alone. We have information packs for jobseekers which are comprehensive, easy to read and easy to follow. There is an old adage that if one wants to get someone to internalise a fact, one has to tell them five different times in three different ways. By repeating the message over and over again, it will eventually bed in.

Chairman

If one goes into a bank today, there are staff roaming the floor, advising people in queues of new services and so forth. Does this happen in social welfare offices? If not, should we consider it, even if it were only in the summer time with students doing it? I am conscious the front-line staff at the hatch are under a lot of pressure. Maybe this would assist them.

Ms Anne Vaughan

No. However, in the Intreo process, one will be told about services in either the group engagement or the one-to-one guidance meeting.

Mr. Paul Carroll

The group engagement process occurs quickly after registration.

Chairman

I accept this will apply to new applicants but I am concerned about existing recipients.

Mr. Paul Carroll

In my division and in those of my colleagues elsewhere, we have been calling existing customers in for significantly larger group engagement sessions, some with up to several hundred people, than is the case in the Intreo model of 20.

We have an excellent information pack which we give to all new registrants and to those who have exhausted their benefit entitlement and who have to apply for jobseeker’s allowance.

When one goes into a new Intreo office, while it may be the old welfare office, the look and feel is different and more of a job centre. For example, for my offices I have ordered posters from the family income support unit that show work does pay. There are several myths that work does not pay.

Chairman

I visited the Intreo offices on Parnell Street and it was very good.

Will the housing assist payment be introduced next year?

Ms Anne Vaughan

Yes, it is part of the Pathways to Work scheme. I understand from the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government that the pilot schemes will be starting next year in certain local authority areas.

Chairman

Why can we not just go for it?

Ms Anne Vaughan

No, because legislation is necessary as well.

Chairman

Is there availability of places to do more schemes?

Ms Anne Vaughan

Yes, the issue is getting groups to come forward.

We have more up-to-date information on penalties. To the beginning of October, there is a cumulative total of 4,250 penalties.

Chairman

I thank the delegation for attending the committee and appreciate their answers to members’ questions.

The joint committee adjourned at 4.10 p.m. until 12.30 p.m. on Tuesday, 15 October 2013.