I welcome Ministers of State, Deputies O'Rourke and Seamus Brennan to the consideration of the Estimate in respect of the Department of Enterprise and Employment by the committee. The meeting of the committee on Tuesday, 14 June 1994 adjourned while considering subheads H to X and Deputy Bruton was in possession. Will Members keep their contributions as brief as possible because of time constraints? The committee is expected to report on the Estimate to the Dáil by 4.20 p.m. today. To do this it will be necessary to conclude the meeting by 3.15 p.m. to ensure that a copy of the documentation may be circulated to Members prior to the Order of Business. I do not wish to curtail the debate, but I ask Members for their co-operation.
Vote 34 - Enterprise and Employment (Revised Estimate) (Resumed).
I am sceptical about the explanation by the Minister of State, Deputy Brennan of the 33 per cent cut in the science and technology budget. It is difficult to reconcile the Minister's indication that he will establish a group to draft a White Paper on policy on science and technology with the 33 per cent cut in Government investment in this area over the past two years. It is a wrong approach and is contrary to the wish of the EU Commission, which wants 3 per cent of GDP assigned to the creation of the seeds for the jobs of tomorrow. The Government's response to the urgings of the EU Commission is to cut its research and development effort.
On subhead Q, the Labour Relations Commission, will the Minister update us on the Government's response to the crisis in TEAM Aer Lingus? Initially, the Government refused to allow the unions see the findings of the Labour Relations Commission, but relented later. However, matters have deteriorated since. The findings of the Labour Relations Commission are not acceptable to the representatives of the workers threatened with the redundancy of 850 of their number from 22 June 1994. There is grave concern at developments. The trade unions accepted cut backs in March last, and while there is no doubt that the business in which TEAM Aer Lingus operates is extremely difficult, the trade unions, with all others, wish to see a solid plan for the successful revival of the company based on a strategy including the participation of the Government as shareholder, the unions and management.
It appears that the Government is reducing the crisis to an industrial relations problem and this is where the deadlock has arisen. People are talking past one another rather than to one another. Members of the committee, and the Chairman of the Labour Party, have advised workers to sit around a table and thrash out the different views on the future of the company. I fail to understand why the Government is refusing to consider that approach if it is supported by backbenchers and given that it reflects promises made by parties when contesting the last general election.
In view of this, the most important item that can be discussed by the committee is the crisis at TEAM Aer Lingus, and the steps the Government can take at this stage to pull the company back from the brink.
As there are no further questions on the subhead, I ask the Minister of State with responsibility for commerce and technology to respond.
The budget for science and technology was £7.6 million in 1988, and in 1993 it was £69 million, which represents substantial growth. The Exchequer portion for 1994 is smaller than the 1993 figure but, I hope that from European funds we will be able at least to maintain last year's expenditure. It is not entirely fair to select the Exchequer portion alone because there are many examples of where we have trimmed national expenditure and substituted European funding. There are the Framework and Eureka programmes as well as private investment. One must add all those together to get the real investment in science and technology. My colleague will deal with subhead Q.
In questions posed today Deputy Bruton castigated the Government on TEAM Aer Lingus. He said it is being treated as a labour relations problem when in effect it is an economic issue relating to industrial restructuring and economics. The Deputy referred to it under the subheading of Labour Relations Commission and, with some justification posed the question of whether it was a matter for another section of the Department. I am happy to deal with the issue.
The Labour Relations Commission's report was the end of the industrial relations road. I agree with Deputy Bruton that it is a serious matter. There is no doubt that we all want to keep the skills of the craft workers and to keep TEAM as a viable company. The difficulty is that the shortfall of £1 million per month cannot be borne any more by the parent company.
On Thursday, prior to the arrival of the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications, Deputy Cowen, we were discussing item 24 of the Labour Relations Commission plan which refers to a forum. Deputy Bruton will recall that I made clear to Deputy Owen on that occasion that it is a non-negotiating forum and that the plan of the group of unions would come under scrutiny. Item 24 acknowledges the potential worth of that plan but the rescue plan put forward in that report must be accepted now otherwise the company cannot remain in existence. There is a fear that the whole edifice of Aer Lingus which is embroiled through TEAM's funding arrangements with the parent company could come tumbling down. No one from any party wishes to see that happening.
I know I speak for all when I say that no one party has the shining light to throw on this problem. We are all involved and want to see it settled. We all want to see employment continue in TEAM. The Labour Relations Commission report has strong elements in it. Having spoken to my colleague, the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, before this meeting I would encourage the immediate establishment of the non-negotiating forum in tandem with the implementation of the recommendations in the report.
Can the Minister understand the frustration of workers in TEAM who see good work being sent away? They feel management got it terribly wrong as recently as last March and are now back suggesting that this plan is the answer that will rebuild markets for the company without, however, setting out the strategy for rebuilding those markets. Does the Minister feel some sympathy for workers who are being asked to accept further cutbacks without this strategy being set out alongside? Would she agree that as taxpayers representing the shareholder we need to have confidence that there is a strategy to rebuild the markets? It is in everyone's interest that the new strategy be on the table. That is the responsibility of the Government. To say that it is secondary and should be discussed in some non-negotiating forum where no one will see it, is avoiding an issue which is now down to the wire. We really need to be honest all around.
We need to be honest. If there is no strategy there will be no firm. That is the first point on which we have to focus. I am not relegating the forum to a secondary position.
I have spoken strongly of the need to have that forum to examine the case point by point but that will take some time. Deputy Bruton has called for honesty, but is it honest to watch the firm go down the tubes? Is it honest to wait until its closure before we accept reality that the LRC document should be worked on in tandem with the work of the non-negotiating forum in examining what has been put forward? Everybody wishes to eulogise the work of the very skilled workers in TEAM. They have committed themselves, and their families, to the industrial infrastructure of that part of north County Dublin. I do not want to see those jobs go but that is what will happen if we do not immediately focus on what has been proposed by the LRC. Difficult though it is we must encourage those working in TEAM to grasp that opportunity as well as the opportunity to have their plan worked on. It is not being relegated to second place but, the problem is costing £1 million a month, and both money and work are now running out.
Is it agreed that we can take subheads Y to Z together? Agreed.
Earlier we talked about industrial development but I am not happy that I have received an answer from the Government side. This year we are planning to spend £340 million on FÁS schemes of one type or another, an increase of 25 per cent. At the same time we are planning to cut spending on industrial support strategies by 11 per cent. The total amount will be £150 million. In other words we are spending more than £2 for training and schemes for every £1 we spend on industrial development strategies. I question whether this represents the best use of scarce money. The Government is tending to rush headlong to commit itself to this spending not only this year but for the next five or six years. Any questioning or criticisms are dismissed as either ill-informed or, in the case of European officials, cheeky. If we look back on the last national development plan we cannot give a clear bill of health to the various FAS schemes. They did not succeed in containing the growth in unemployment generally or help the long term unemployed.
The proportion of long term unemployed people grew despite the heavy emphasis on FÁS schemes which are now to be increased by 25 per cent.
It is not just political critics who express misgivings. The Culliton report clearly spelled out huge problems with FÁS and its priorities. One of the big difficulties outlined in the report was the lack of emphasis on training in industry.
This has not improved and IBEC has produced proposals which are highly critical of this activity. The consultants to the NESF produced a paper showing that the placement rates for many of the FÁS schemes were extremely poor. It was 16 per cent in the case of the social employment schemes, 19 per cent in the case of alternance schemes and 16 per cent in the case of the vocational training opportunities schemes. These are poor results for the people taking part. They have also proved to be the most expensive schemes within the remit of FÁS. There has been a slight modification in the social employment scheme in its new community employment development programme formation.
The most recent ESRI medium term review was also highly critical of our efforts in this area and pointed to numerous weaknesses such as that there are too many unsuccesful FÁS programmes. It said that a huge missing element in the human resource programme is the focus on targeted action on initial education to prevent early failure and drop out. It was concerned that the new CEDP had not dealt with the weaknesses in the SES. It went on to be highly critical of self evaluation or evaluation being conducted predominantly by sponsors of programmes.
Those bodies have given warning signals about manpower policy. It is not good enough that we have not had a clear statement, by way of a White Paper, on manpower policy from the Government setting out what these schemes are intended to do and the standards against which they should be evaluated. We are being less than honest with the public and there is now widespread cynicism about many of the FÁS schemes. In some cases this is undeserved but it results from the refusal of the Government to come clean and deal with these cases honestly.
Some specific decisions have been made in the past year which I question. It is still not clear whether the very successful employment allowance scheme has been axed or put on a drip. The report by the consultants to the NESF showed that at the end of one year 100 per cent of the people participating were still working, unlike the SES where the corresponding figure was only 16 per cent. It was the cheapest of all the schemes and gave people the chance to set up enterprises within three months of becoming unemployed. If we are emphasising entrepreneurship and initiative, we should have retained this scheme but it was axed. The CEDP excludes people on deserted wife's benefit and refuses to give a class A stamp. It does not give a foothold back into the workforce. The NESF report, which will be published shortly, clearly shows that what is needed is not these stop gap schemes but something which provides a clear pathway back into employment. The NESF report questions the CEDP philosophy.
In this year's Estimate we are cutting back the allocation for training in industry. Earlier we dealt with huge cuts in the training elements of the budgets of Forbairt and the IDA. This is contrary to recommendations for increased emphasis on such training, which we understood had been accepted by the Government. It is ironic that the special adviser to the Minister is one of the authors of one of the highly critical reports. There is the skill and experience in the Department to come up with a better and coherent policy in this area rather than building piecemeal one scheme upon the other. A coherent policy statement should be issued by the Government.
I also wish to draw attention to the evaluation of the FÁS schemes and training and education generally. There have been newspaper reports on the NESF's evaluation of these schemes. Unfortunately, the NESF paper which dealt with this is not available to the public or Oireachtas Members. I sought a copy of it. I understand that once the final report of the NESF is issued, this paper can be made available. According to newspaper reports, there was serious concern about the benefit of some of the training provided at the moment, particularly by FÁS. The Minister accepted a report by IBEC yesterday which dealt with the same issue. The Minister might use this occasion to respond to its concerns. It seems from newspaper accounts of this report that IBEC believes that more training and education should be given to people already in employment.
I raised doubts about the National Development Plan and the European funding for this area. As Deputy Bruton said, we need a full debate on the issue and we must carefully examine the evaluation process and carry out a cost-benefit analysis of what we are doing and to consider our objectives. There is a view that the purpose of many of these schemes is simply to take people off the dole. I do not fully agree with this but we need to state clearly that we are serious about training and education which is needed. We have come a long way in recent years and the quality of the schemes has improved. A few years ago an office procedure and training course was organised in a centre close to my constituency and many of the girls taking part did not have telephones but had to use bananas as an improvisation I presume we have moved on from that stage and now courses are more comprehensive. If a person is not eligible for unemployment benefit or assistance because a spouse is working he is often not eligible for some of the FÁS schemes. This should be looked at from the point of view of giving some people a chance to participate. There are other technical aspects of the schemes which need to be looked at and I am sure we can put them to the Minister in due course. I would welcome the Minister's response to the general debate now beginning on training and education and the evaluation of schemes.
I also endorse what has been said about——
Bananas?
No, not bananas although there might be a new definition of a banana republic. We have a sizeable budget for education and training and if we planned how to spend it carefully and properly we could get better results than we are getting. That must be our great challenge for the year ahead. It is a fundamental mistake to spend such a small proportion of that budget directly on training people already in jobs; so little goes directly to industry and the services. It ought to be a key principle to hold what we have and to try to consolidate the number of people already in employment. To assist in doing that we should direct more money towards training people already in employment, in accordance with the recommendations made by IBEC in their report to the Minister yesterday. I hope that report will not be ignored and some action will be quickly taken on its recommendations.
It is important for workers who began their working life a long time ago to be assisted to keep pace with technology through in-service training which will enable them to increase their level of skills and give them the versatility to take on new tasks, perhaps within the same industry. That will only happen if there is proper provision for in-house training within industry. We are spending far too little of the budget on that. I look forward to a response from the Minister on that issue which was raised by IBEC yesterday in a very sensible fashion and I hope it will not be ignored. While we must always strive to create new jobs, we must put the same degree of energy, planning and investment into retaining existing jobs.
While the new CEDP schemes are a marginal improvement on the old SES schemes, there is enormous scope for further improvement. The training element is far too small and the evaluation and monitoring has not been clearly worked out, or if it has been worked out, it has not been done in a way which can convince me that, at the end of the day, this huge investment will lead to a larger proportion of the long term unemployed getting jobs as a result of these training schemes. The schemes were rather rushed. The core idea was good but the practical details have not been worked out. There is scope for a great deal of work to be done and if that is not done, a great deal of the money spent will yield no great return in terms of job creation.
Women who have not been signing on are currently excluded from these new CEDP schemes. In that respect, they are very severely penalised. Ironically, a great deal of the caring work previously carried out by women on a voluntary basis is now being undertaken by men who are being paid it under these schemes. Women are suffering twice over by being displaced from work which they did on a voluntary basis because of the operation of these schemes. That is a severe setback and an unintended result.
It is, of course, a matter for the Minister for Social Welfare and not any of the Ministers present. Nonetheless, there must be co-ordination between Departments to ensure that we get a better result and a better return from these schemes. That is one of the areas in which I would like the Minister to take a lead in seeking a solution. If women who have not been signing on were eligible for these schemes it would make a great difference to their outlook on life, their self-esteem and to very small family budgets, particularly where there are large numbers of children. It would also make a difference in regard to employment creation.
We are stumbling into this without any proper plan and there will not be a proper plan until we come up with the White Paper on manpower and training for which Deputy Bruton is constantly calling. Only when that is done can we proceed along the lines which will yield the returns to which we are entitled from this very big investment in education and training which in the past has not yielded the result which it ought to.
On training, the Army apprentice training school has existed for a number of years and there is no doubting the quality of its end product each year. Apprentices have won many international awards. There is great expertise in the Department of Defence which is not being properly utilised. The tremendous opportunity to use that expertise to train young people should not be missed. The Minister of State should give some consideration to fostering greater liaison between her Department and the Department of Defence.
The Deputy from west Cork is not here, unfortunately.
Deputy Sheehan is involved in maritime affairs.
Deputy Sheehan was very active here the other day. Deputy Molloy is also not able to join us. Apparently, he was also very active on Friday.
Who did not turn up when two votes were called?
That is right, he was not even here for one of the votes. We would have liked to have had him here for this very interesting and important debate.
If the Government cannot maintain its majority of 35 it is a sad day.
There must be a town commissioners meeting somewhere.
Under what item on the agenda does this onslaught on democracy arise?
We would have liked to have the benefit of their thoughts on this.
We will have a FÁS scheme for aettendance at committees.
In my dealings with the public I find a great level of cynicism on this whole area of FÁS training and the public and EC funds which are pumped in under the global heading of training. Questions are asked about what is achieved and if we are half training people without proper certification for jobs which do not exist. Is it money merely to keep people off the unemployment register? Is it there for grandiose bodies which have appeared over the past few years? I see, for example, under the various subheads that the European Social Fund pumps £87.897 million in the 1994 Estimate into training.
We have heard IBEC talking about training for people in jobs. Why should the taxpayer have to pay for training people in jobs? Surely, the greatest challenge facing us as a society is to reduce our tax rates to encourage job creation? We will create jobs more quickly with low tax rates rather than with subsidies and training grants etc. We are investing large sums of money in training. There is a major link between social welfare and FÁS because those who, through no fault of their own, find themselves unemployed, ask themselves if they should stay on social welfare or move on to an SES scheme and what benefits they will lose if they move.
Unfortunately, the current structure has no real direction. There is a shotgun approach with shells scattered all over the area and pellets flying everywhere when we should use a rifle to tackle individual problems. It is a waste of tax-payer's and EC money which could be better directed in other areas. Much good work is being done but on balance the benefits that should be available are not.
To an extent a significant portion of this money is hush money to keep people relatively quiet while they are participating in part-time schemes rather than creating long term, gainful, meaningful employment. I regret saying that but the purpose of these committees is to give us an opportunity to discuss such issues. I am keen to hear the Minister's considered response to what is a general accusation.
Deputies Bruton, Haughey, Quill, Power and Burke made interesting contributions which illustrate the extent of the interest in this area. During the debate on the Industrial Training (Apprenticeship Levy) Bill in the Dáil, Deputy Bruton suggested the need for a White Paper on training. That is a good point and I hope we will have a decision on it soon.
Deputy Bruton also raised training for people in employment and then the type of training under the various FÁS programmes. I do not favour spending money on training for the employed at the expense of the unemployed but that is not what the Deputy meant. There are specific needs to be met in training for the employed and for the unemployed.
Deputies Burke and Quill also mentioned training for the employed. At an open forum held by IBEC yesterday afternoon I was presented with a document which sought the establishment of a specific body under IBEC to direct and formulate policies for training for people in employment. I was ad idem with them on many points but not on that. I agreed that we are not spending enough on training in employment. As Deputies Quill and Bruton said, such training consolidates existing jobs and, therefore, in its own way, contributes to employment and looks to the future in terms of innovation, research and management. In comparison with other European countries we do not spend enough on training in either the public or private sector.
FÁS has set up a special industry division. The Department is not completely satisfied with it and is conducting a study in conjunction with small and large employers. We are putting some proposals to the Minister for Finance for consideration in the context of the Estimates. We will seek to identify both public and private moneys for training employed people and work it into the budget. The content of such training is equally important. I agree with the points made on education, training and the importance of certification. There are difficulties here about whose terrain one is encroaching on, but we hope to reach an agreement with the Department of Education on the training needs of those in industry.
On Deputy Power's point about the Army apprentice school, some time ago he gave me some valuable information about the work being done in that school. With my officials I have had a series of meetings with all the State agencies, including the ESB, Bord na Móna and the General Council of County Councils and I will meet with Army representatives in the next two weeks to ask them to use the existing infrastructure to increase the number of apprentices. I will seek a transfer of funding or some other arrangement to facilitate that. We should use the existing Army tradition and infrastructure for apprenticeships before we randomly go after other schemes. I have noted the Deputy's point and will keep the committee informed of any developments in the area. We hope that by September we will have reached a composite agreement with the various bodies, including the General Council of County Councils.
We have had a useful debate on the direction of FÁS, its value and its efforts at rationalisation. We are rationalising programmes and this is why we brought SES, CEDP and teamwork together in one programme called community employment. It is not a panacea for long term unemployed people or a guarantee that they will have a job at the end of their time on community employment. However there are a number of positive aspects to the new programme. It involves more training than did any of the previous schemes. I am responsible for training and am devising the modules for training in conjunction with FÁS. There was always concern that SES, CEDP and teamwork were only for one year. Up to 50 per cent of people on community employment will be kept on for two or three years if they are key employees who need more training.
There is far more female involvement in the new scheme. At the last count up to 40 per cent of those in community employment were female. However, there is room for improvement. Lone parents are eligible if they are in receipt of the lone parent's allowance but this needs to be broadened as women who are not signing on for credits are not eligible for community employment. There is clear discrimination there. We also need to face up to the fact that this is also a clear political issue. Members of the committee will know to what I refer. The issue needs to be openly addressed.
The level of training will increase. Its content has to be based on proper standards and lead to certification. There is a much more important element which I am determined to get. The OECD report, and other reports from NESC and the new forum, suggested that a hand-holding exercise is required. The OECD, in particular, said that we must be interventionist in the active labour market. In other words, as the Deputies said, there is no point in putting somebody on a programme for 12 months, 18 months or two years and shunting them out when the programme is over. That approach leads to increasing cynicism about the programme.
In the new community employment programme we must have quite intense vocational guidance and counselling leading eventually to job placement within local areas through the local area partnerships. Deputies from areas where there are local area partnerships know that the mix of industry, unions and workers allows doors to be opened to the long term unemployed. There have been particular successes in some north Dublin area partnerships and in some Cork area partnerships.
While we may urge employers to employ the long term unemployed there is resistance to it despite the moral imperative on all of us, including employers, to do what we can for the long term unemployed. However, the involvement of formidable industrialists in area partnerships has opened doors which would never have been opened previously to the long term unemployed.
I accept that we are only beginning to tackle this issue. I empathised with Deputy Quill who asked if we were stumbling into necessary changes with regard to our objectives in the community employment and other schemes. We are clear about how we wish to achieve our aims. We want people, as far as possible, to secure employment after paricipation in the scheme. We want proper longer duration training, local vocational guidance counselling and pro-active job placement in the local community. We are working our way through that agenda. It is a massive agenda and a huge amount of money is being spent on it. This committee has a right to see that the money is spent correctly. I hope we will have an opportunty to discuss this again when we are not as rushed.
In reply to Deputy Bruton, I am actively considering producing a White Paper on training. If it is produced we will have come a long way. I agree with Deputy Burke's remarks about social welfare. There is a need to look at social welfare, and the billions spent on it, in an active rather than a passive sense.
I thank the Minister for her response. She mentioned the huge amount of money being spent on training etc., and the responsibility of society to give jobs to the long term unemployed. I accept that the Government has an interventionist role to play and should be involved in job creation. However, the most successful way to create jobs is to create a suitable climate of taxation and a return on investment for the entrepreneur. We should encourage those in business to provide products or services for the community here or abroad rather than giving the entrepreneur a grant to employ somebody who will not yield a return.
A person with a small business employing perhaps five people should be able to retain some of the profits from the investment so that it will not be taken through corporation profits tax at 40 per cent and income tax. There is no point in taking huge taxes and at the same time giving industrialists yearly grants to take people off the register of the long term unemployed. The State has a responsibility to help and intervene in the economy. There is gross wastage in the amount of money going into the bottomless pit of training. We would be better off putting the money into reducing taxation to encourage employment.
Nobody could dispute the need for a supportive taxation environment for industry to encourage industrialists to create employment. There is not an enormous waste of public money in FÁS, its programmes and projects. We have strategies to create a confident taxation environment. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Ahern in this year's budget working with the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, and the Minister of State, Deputy Brennan, introduced taxation policies to support small businesses. However, I have been around long enough to know that nothing will happen if employment is left to market forces.
I said the Government should be interventionist.
The country that leaves everything to market forces is not taking the right course. There must be a proper balance between active structured intervention — which we hope to achieve through the FÁS programmes — and a supportive or looser taxation regime, of which the Deputy spoke, to encourage industry. It requires balance.
When we look at the results of CEDP and other programmes we sometimes overlook two other aspects. First, the developmental needs of the individuals who participate in the programmes who, we hope, are encouraged and motivated through their participation. Second, we cannot overlook the infrastructural changes that have been achieved throughout Ireland. They are not as noticeable in Dublin as they are in counties such as Cork, Louth, Donegal, Wexford and Westmeath, which are represented on the committee, projects and programmes undertaken by FÁS have physically changed the face of Ireland. It is an aspect about which we do not talk enough. The Chairman knows, from the experience of County Cork, the impact of projects and programmes undertaken by FÁS. However, the debate is healthy and it is right that such things are open and accounted for.
We agreed to conclude by 3.15 p.m. to enable circulation of a supplementary order paper. We must conclude our business to enable the civil servants to prepare the necessary documentation. I ask the Deputies for their co-operation in this.
Will the Minister confirm the status of the Teamwork programme which was designed for the under 25 age group? Is that programme integrated into the CEDP and is CEDP available to young people? What is the future of the enterprise allowance scheme? There has been a good deal of fudging by Government about its future and whether it is abolished or is functioning on a limited budget. Does the Minister believe there should be more competition in the provision of training? The ESRI clearly favours such competition. Is she well disposed to a guidance and placement service, as recommended by the NESF?
The main reason for scepticism about the community employment programme is that it involves schemes which do not create jobs. Could she envisage these placements being made in the commercial sector? Given that all indicators point to involving industry in the provision of training, why not have CEDP placement in the commercial sector, under special conditions? Then unemployed people would get real employment and perhaps the opportunity to stay on after the CEDP is finished. Why should it be confined to voluntary and community employment?
On women who have not been signing on and are accordingly excluded from participation in CEDP schemes has the Minister had any discussions with the Minister for Social Welfare about removing the barriers to participation in the schemes? If not, is it her intention to have such discussions, so that we can put in place a regime which would enable women in that position to participate in these schemes?
In some cases men are not in a position to sign on; it is not solely related to women. For example, if the chief income earner in a household is the wife, the husband is often not in a position sign on.
Deputy Burke raised the question of creating jobs in the current employment and taxation environment and asked whether we should put so much money into education and training, when it might be better to use that money to reduce taxation. I questioned the amount of EU funding in education and training under the national plan.
Deputy Burke did not develop the point but surely infrastructure is important for employment creation; the provision of roads, harbours, etc. That requires intervention by the Government and gives the Administration a role in creating an environment for employment. The balance in the national plan is wrong. There is too much emphasis on education and training at the expense of other important factors in creating jobs.
Projects under the Teamwork scheme will continue until they are completed but they will become part of the community employment scheme. When I was speaking earlier about rationalising schemes in the future, I neglected to mention the age gap. We brought the minimum age limit for the community employment scheme from 25 to 21 but that did not cover people between the ages of 18 and 21 who do not go to third level colleges.
Under the youth start scheme into which Teamwork will slot we are gathering all the programmes which would enable those people to gain useful experience and training. By the autumn we will have formulated our ideas on the youth start scheme which will be on a pilot basis from the Departmental budget and will then be included in the budget of FAS. We hope it will be regarded positively and we have every indication it will be accepted as part of the EU wide youth start programme. Deputy Bruton also asked if we were in favour of competition for training, we are.
What about the enterprise allowance scheme?
That scheme and EIS 2 are temporarily suspended although current programmes under the schemes will be completed. That is in the context of rationalisation, of which I spoke earlier and which the Deputy favours. It is also in the context of the local area partnerships, the Leader programmes and county enterprise partnership boards, and the wealth of extra facilities for those who wish to foster a business idea. When we see where everyone has slotted into these projects, it may be apposite to renew the programme but we are exploring other avenues.
The Minister said he would restore it.
I prefer to be more cautious.
I am in favour of competition for training but clearly other people have different ideas. FÁS transfers most of its training to outside bodies through tenders under which people put forward their ideas.
Deputy Quill asked about female participation and whether I had spoken to the Minister for Social Welfare. The two Departments have been in contact about the local area partnerships, which will be the modus operandi for much of the community employment scheme. We have tried to solve the problems of women and men who are excluded. Deputy Haughey was keen that unemployed men married to working women should be considered. The imbalance and discrimination is far greater for women than for men but the Department is looking at the problem in the context of local area partnerships. There is a political problem.
Is the Minister optimistic about this?
I will see what comes from the discussions. Deputy Haughey criticised the national plan and mentioned the need to have active labour market intervention in developing infrastructure. Surely training under the local area partnerships can lead to jobs in infrastructure, whether in water and sewage schemes, roads, peat stations, Tallaght hospital, etc. Long term unemployed people should be incorporated to some extent within the infrastructural arrangements and the large EU and Government funded projects. That will marry the two factors.
Report of Select Committee.
That concludes our consideration of Vote 34, the Estimate for the Department of Enterprise and Employment. On behalf of the committee I thank the Ministers of State, Deputies O'Rourke, Brennan and their officials. I also thank our Clerk, and the Deputies who participated in the debate.
The committee will meet again tomorrow at 2.15 p.m. for a briefing before beginning our consideration of An Bord Bia Bill, 1994, at 2.30 p.m. On all Estimates considered by this Committee, I propose the following draft report:
The Select Committee has considered the Estimates for the public services for 1994 for the following Departments: the Department of Transport, Energy and Communications; the Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry; the Department of the Marine, including a Supplementary Estimate; the Department of Tourism and Trade; the Department of Enterprise and Employment; and all other Estimates relevant to these Departments. The Estimates are hereby reported to the Dáil.
Report agreed to.
Ordered to report to the Dáil accordingly.
The Select Committee adjourned at 3.10 p.m.