Written Answers Nos. 107-114
107. Deputy Thomas P. Broughan asked the Minister for Social Protection the measures her Department is taking to tackle youth unemployment and youth under-employment so that young citizens, particularly graduates, are facilitated in finding employment in their own fields of expertise. [49815/13]
View answerIn the first instance, the Government’s primary strategy to tackle all forms of unemployment, including youth unemployment, is to create the environment for a strong economic recovery by promoting competitiveness and productivity through the Action Plan for Jobs. Economic recovery will underpin jobs growth and thus reduce unemployment and long-term unemployment. Past experience suggests that youth unemployment, which tends to rise relatively rapidly in a downturn, can be expected to fall relatively rapidly during the recovery.
The Government is also implementing a number of programmes to assist young unemployed persons and keep young jobseekers close to the labour market. There are five main approaches being taken to tackle youth unemployment: education, training, job search assistance/guidance, work experience, and encouraging job creation. These actions range across a number of Departments and Agencies and include:
- The Youthreach programme providing 6,000 integrated education, training and work experience for early school leavers without any qualifications or vocational training who are between 15 and 20 years of age;
- The Vocational Training Opportunities Scheme scheme, which provides a range of courses to meet the education and training needs of unemployed people over 21 years of age, particularly focusing upon early school leavers;
- The Back to Education Allowance scheme run by the Department of Social Protection provides income maintenance for unemployed people returning to further or higher education. Over 6,500 young people participated on this scheme in the last academic year;
- Approximately 12,000 persons aged under 25 completed a training course with FÁS in 2012. This excludes apprenticeships and evening courses;
- MOMENTUM, a scheme for education and training interventions supports the provision of free education and training projects to allow 6,500 long term jobseekers to gain skills and to access work opportunities in identified growing sectors. Over 1,250 of these places are assigned specifically for under 25s;
- The JobBridge National Internship Scheme is focused on providing work experience to young people with the total number of placements of young people on JobBridge during 2012 at 2,700; and
- Long-term unemployed youth will also benefit from the JobsPlus initiative which is designed to encourage employers to recruit long-term unemployed people. Under this scheme the State will pay circa €1 of every €4 it costs the employer to recruit a person from the Live Register.;
The most recent statistics available from the CSO’s Quarterly National Household Survey show the level of youth unemployment has fallen from an average of 75,000 in 2010 to 63,000 in the most recent twelve months for which data are available. The level of employment of young people appears to have stabilised, and indeed the employment rate (proportion of the population with jobs) for those aged 20-24 years rose from 46.5% in mid-2012 to 49% in the second quarter of this year. With regard to the expected future impact of existing policies, the original Action Plan for Jobs sets out a target for 100,000 net new jobs to be created by 2016, many of which will be filled by young people.
Graduates who become unemployed have access, through the INTREO service of my Department, to the full range of labour market programmes on the same basis as all young jobseekers.
Looking forward, in addition to current initiatives, policies to increase youth employment will be supplemented by additional measures under the Youth Guarantee which will be rolled out in 2014.
The Department of Social Protection has set up an interdepartmental group with officials and programme managers from the Department of Education and Skills, Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation, and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, to review the current range of youth employment policies in Ireland to assess what measures will need to be taken to commence the implementation of the Guarantee. It is intended to produce a concrete plan for the implementation of the Guarantee for consideration by the Government in December before being transmitted to the European Commission by the end of 2013.
As an initial step towards preparing for implementation of the guarantee, provision was made in the 2014 Budget for:
- Changing the eligibility criteria for Jobs Plus to make it easier for young people to qualify for the scheme.
- an additional intake of 1,500 young people on to the very successful JobBridge scheme
- ensuring that 1,000 places on the Tús scheme are targeted at young people
- developing a pilot programme to support young unemployed people to take up opportunities under schemes such as Your First EURES Job
- ring-fencing a minimum of 2,000 training places for under-25s by the Department of Education and Skills, under a follow-up to the successful Momentum programme that operated in 2013, with income support for participants being provided by my Department
- the Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation making funds available to young entrepreneurs via Micro finance Ireland and other business start-up schemes.
In total, the provision across these headings in the 2014 Budget comes to about €46 million.
108. Deputy Michael Creed asked the Minister for Social Protection the reason for the delay in issuing a decision on a disability allowance appeal in respect of a person (details supplied) in County Cork; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49619/13]
View answerThe Social Welfare Appeals Office has advised me that an appeal by the person concerned was registered in that office on 14 August 2013. It is a statutory requirement of the appeals process that the relevant papers and comments by or on behalf of the Deciding Officer on the grounds of appeal be sought from the Department of Social Protection. These papers were received in the Social Welfare Appeals Office on 5 November 2013 and the case will be referred to an Appeals Officer who will make a summary decision on the appeal based on documentary evidence presented or, if required, hold an oral hearing.
The Department informs me that backlog clearance activity in the Disability Allowance area has increased the number of appeals being dealt with on that scheme. Consequently, there are still some delays occurring there in having papers sent to the Social Welfare Appeals Office for processing. Every effort is being made to ensure that the relevant papers are prepared and submitted to the SWAO as quickly as possible.
The Social Welfare Appeals Office functions independently of the Minister for Social Protection and of the Department and is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements.
109. Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin asked the Minister for Social Protection from where the €200 million funding for the youth guarantee is coming; from where the third of this as an Irish contribution is coming in view of the fact that we have only budgeted €14 million this year for the youth guarantee; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49623/13]
View answerThe Department of Social Protection has set up an interdepartmental group with officials and programme managers from the Department of Education and Skills, Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation, and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, to review the current range of youth employment policies in Ireland to assess what measures will need to be taken to commence the implementation of the Youth Guarantee. The Department of Social Protection has also engaged the assistance of the OECD in developing the Youth Guarantee Policy.
It is intended to produce a concrete plan for the implementation of the Guarantee for consideration by the Government in December before being transmitted to the European Commission by the end of 2013. Development of the implementation plan will include identification of the costs of implementation, and how it is envisaged that these will be met. (how much can be provided from domestic sources, and what is the likely support from EU funds, e.g. European Social Fund (ESF) and Youth Employment Initiative (ESF)).
For Ireland this plan will likely require:
- Earmarking a quota of additional places/opportunities for young people on existing schemes.
- Varying the eligibility conditions for access to certain schemes by young people - for example reduce the eligibility criteria so that young people can access places/opportunities after 4 – 6 months of unemployment rather than the general requirement of 12 months unemployment.
- Expanding the range of opportunities currently on offer to young people in the form of further education and training, internships, subsidised private-sector recruitment, and supports for self-employment.
In 2012, we spent an estimated €170m on participation in employment, training and further education programmes for jobless young people. Significant further amounts were expended on mainstream provision of further and higher education preparing young people for entry to working life. Final estimates of cost and participants for 2013 will be produced at the end of this year when full-year cost and participant estimates (including age-breakdowns) will be available.
As an initial step towards preparing for implementation of the guarantee, provision was made in the 2014 Budget for:
- Changing the eligibility criteria for Jobs Plus to make it easier for young people to qualify for the scheme.
- an additional intake of 1,500 young people on to the very successful JobBridge scheme
- ensuring that 1,000 places on the Tús scheme are targeted at young people
- developing a pilot programme to support young unemployed people to take up opportunities under schemes such as Your First EURES Job
- ring-fencing a minimum of 2,000 training places for under-25s by the Department of Education and Skills, under a follow-up to the successful Momentum programme that operated in 2013, with income support for participants being provided by my department
- the Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation making funds available to young entrepreneurs via Micro finance Ireland and other business start-up schemes.
In total, the provision across these headings in the 2014 Budget comes to about €46 million. The final amount of expenditure on youth programmes for 2014 cannot be predicted with certainty as it will in part be determined by the level of take-up by young people and on the mix of programmes involved. It is however likely to be significantly up on 2012 levels.
Given the scale of existing and future provision it is clear that the bulk of funding for labour market programmes for young people will continue to come from domestic exchequer sources. We will however endeavour to maximise Ireland’s share of the additional funding available from the EU.
It is estimated that EU funding (ESF and YEI) for these programmes will be of the order of €64 million in respect of each of the years 2014 and 2015. Given the way the funding is structured, in order to recoup these amounts from the EU in due course, it will be necessary that we spend, in the first instance, close to €100 million on relevant programmes each year, or close to €200 million in 2014-2015 overall. As will be clear from the above, it is anticipated that actual expenditure will be significantly in excess of that amount over the period concerned.
110. Deputy Bernard J. Durkan asked the Minister for Social Protection if assistance will be offered to help secure employment by way of training/upskilling in the case of a person (details supplied) in County Kildare who is currently receiving unemployment benefit; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49630/13]
View answerThe person concerned was interviewed by an officer from the Maynooth Employment Service’s office on the 12 July 2013 and on that day she applied for two computer courses. In October 2013 the person concerned informed the Department that she wished to withdraw her applications for the courses due to domestic circumstances and since then she has not been in contact with the Maynooth Employment Service’s office. It is open to the person concerned to re-engage with the Department’s Employment Services to explore the options available to her.
111. Deputy Pat Breen asked the Minister for Social Protection the reason payment of jobseeker's allowance has ceased in respect of a person (details supplied) in County Clare; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49635/13]
View answerThe person concerned was refused jobseeker’s allowance by a Deciding Officer of the Department on the grounds that his means exceeded the statutory limit.
The Social Welfare Appeals Office has advised me that an appeal by the person concerned together with the relevant Departmental papers were received by that office on 18 November 2013 and that the case will be referred to an Appeals Officer who will make a summary decision on the appeal based on the documentary evidence presented or, if required, hold an oral hearing.
The Social Welfare Appeals Office functions independently of the Minister for Social Protection and of the Department and is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements.
112. Deputy Noel Coonan asked the Minister for Social Protection when an application for a carer's allowance appeal will be finalised in respect of a person (details supplied) in County Tipperary; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49640/13]
View answerThe Social Welfare Appeals Office has advised me that an appeal by the person concerned was referred to an Appeals Officer on 18 October 2013. The Appeals Officer will shortly decide whether she will make a summary decision on the appeal based on the documentary evidence presented or, whether an oral hearing will be required in order to determine the appeal.
The Social Welfare Appeals Office functions independently of the Minister for Social Protection and of the Department and is responsible for determining appeals against decisions in relation to social welfare entitlements.
