Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 7 October 2021
82. Deputy Aindrias Moynihan asked the Minister for Social Protection the consideration that is being given for flexibility for participants over 55 years of age who are currently engaged in a community employment scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [48621/21]
View answerAs the Deputy is aware, Community Employment (CE) Scheme is an active labour market programme designed to provide eligible long-term unemployed people and other disadvantaged persons with an opportunity to engage in meaningful work within their communities on a temporary, fixed term basis to improve their prospect of returning to employment.
CE placements are intended to be temporary and subject to time limits. This is to ensure the continued availability of places on CE schemes for a broad range of long-term unemployed candidates, while those completing the scheme progress to employment in the open labour market.
There is already graduated additional flexibility for participants on CE aged 55 and over. For example, those over 55 years of age can remain on CE for up to three years, without undertaking formal training, while CE participants who are aged over 55 and commenced on CE prior 2017 can continue to be eligible to stay on CE for six consecutive years.
CE participants over the age of 62 can participate on a continuous basis up to the state pension age on the CE Service Support Stream (SSS). Currently up to a maximum 10% of CE places are allocated to this stream. There are 1,400 CE participants on this stream at present.
CE participants’ contracts, including those aged over 55, were extended over the course of the pandemic, as a emergency support measure, which resulted in many contracts extending beyond the time limits outlined above. Earlier this week, the Minister for Social Protection, Minister Humphreys, and I announced a further contract extension to 4th February 2022 for existing CE and Tús participants. These final contract extensions will provide all participants with additional time to complete their training and benefit from work experience on CE.
In order to ensure that all employment and activation programmes have the best outcomes for participants, CE will continue to be made available to support those who are long term unemployed and furthest removed from the labour market, including those whose employment has been impacted by COVID-19. At the same time the eligibility criteria for CE and the length of time persons can stay on CE is kept under active review by my Department to ensure the best outcomes for individual participants and to support the vital community services delivered by schemes.
