asked the Minister for Social Welfare if he will outline the standing practice employed by employment exchanges in submitting names of unemployed persons for notified casual employment vacancies in the Department of Defence; whether in the case of recent vacancies for carpenters at Collins Barracks, Cork, the standing instructions were complied with; if not, why not; and, if so, why the list submitted included the names of persons not registered as unemployed, or registered for one day only, and excluded registered person No. 855349 (name supplied to the Department), who had been signing for employment for several weeks, and who had previous satisfactory service with the Department of Defence.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Casual Employment in Department of Defence.
4.
In submitting names of suitable persons for vacancies of the kind mentioned by the Deputy, preference is given to those who are holders of military service medals or who have had certain specified service with the permanent Defence Force. If there are none, or not sufficient of such persons to fill the vacancies, the names of a reasonable number of other suitable persons may be submitted, preference being given to those who are in receipt of unemployment assistance.
Failure to follow this procedure and an error of judgment on the part of the official concerned resulted in only three unemployment benefit claimants, including the only suitable medal holder on the register, being submitted for the vacancies for carpenter at Collins Barracks, Cork.
Am I to take it that the Parliamentary Secretary wishes to convey that the standing regulations were not carried out in this particular case?
That is so.
Am I to take it further that the only explanation for this appears to be that there was an error of judgment made by one of the officers of this Department?
The list of submissions was not prepared in accordance with the standing instructions.
Did I understand the Parliamentary Secretary to say that that arose out of an error of judgment on the part of one of the officers in his Department?
Yes.
I wonder did the Parliamentary Secretary ascertain, during the course of his inquiry into this matter, that the two people who did secure the posts were, first, people who were fully employed up to the night before they got the appointments in utter disregard of the class of people who were genuinely unemployed and, secondly, that their names were submitted to his Department by a Fianna Fáil Deputy and that, in fact, they could be regarded as political hacks of the Fianna Fáil Party?
I am not aware of these facts, or the allegations made by the Deputy.
I wonder would the Parliamentary Secretary endeavour to investigate the matter further? Would he endeavour to ascertain whether or not this alleged error on the part of one of his officers was not, in the first place, the responsibility of somebody higher up—very much higher up—and that this officer was instructed to include these two names because of the reason I have given, because they were attached to Fianna Fáil, and that their names were recommended by a Fianna Fáil Deputy? I wonder would the Parliamentary Secretary investigate whether that is true or not?
The Parliamentary Secretary will fully investigate the statements of the Deputy.