Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 28 January 2014
109. Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh asked the Minister for Social Protection her views on the conclusion of the Union of Students of Ireland in its document, Vision for Post-Bailout Ireland, that the JobBridge scheme is beyond repair and should be phased out; and the steps she will take in response to same. [3955/14]
Amharc ar fhreagraIs the Minister aware of the Union of Students in Ireland, USI, document, Vision for Post-Bailout Ireland, and what it has to say on the JobBridge scheme, that the scheme is beyond repair and should be phased out? The USI is the latest of several unions to have come to that conclusion, to have rejected the scheme and to have said it needs to be ended.
On 23 January, the total number of persons who have participated on JobBridge was more than 25,200 and there are currently nearly 6,400 participants. Data on current recipients by county are included in the table following this reply.
I share the Union of Students in Ireland’s vision that Ireland’s real competitive advantage lies in producing highly skilled, highly qualified graduates which must form the foundation of our future workforce. I also note that the USI considers that internships will continue to form an important entry route into employment for many graduates. In this regard a criticism in the past, made by the USI among others, was that unemployed graduates lost their jobseeker's payment if they took up an internship.
JobBridge was partly a response to such criticism but I emphasise it does not cater just for graduates. It is designed to ensure both graduate and non-graduate jobseekers can secure the real workplace experience without which many would have difficulty in progressing into employment. This means some of the opportunities offered through JobBridge do not fit the profile of the traditional graduate internship. I make no apologies for this and neither will the very many interns who found JobBridge a very effective route into paid employment. The independent evaluation of JobBridge found that 61% of interns were moving into employment within five months of finishing JobBridge, and there were very low levels of displacement and deadweight.
JobBridge has been recognised as an outstanding success and is delivering for thousands of jobseekers by providing them with valuable opportunities to gain relevant work experience, knowledge and skills in a workplace environment to cut across the problem that some highly qualified graduates cannot get a job because they have no work experience. When they get work experience, which JobBridge provides, they often become extremely employable. Many interns leave JobBridge before the internship is complete because the company for which they have gone to work has offered them employment.
JobBridge participants by county - January 2014
|
County |
Current |
Total since scheme inception |
|
DUBLIN |
1,995 |
8,486 |
|
CORK |
573 |
2,392 |
|
GALWAY |
401 |
1,622 |
|
LIMERICK |
341 |
1,297 |
|
KILDARE |
226 |
855 |
|
DONEGAL |
260 |
852 |
|
WATERFORD |
200 |
841 |
|
TIPPERARY |
220 |
801 |
|
KERRY |
206 |
731 |
|
WEXFORD |
175 |
730 |
|
MAYO |
202 |
633 |
|
LOUTH |
155 |
615 |
|
WESTMEATH |
149 |
599 |
|
MEATH |
164 |
570 |
|
CLARE |
134 |
542 |
|
WICKLOW |
115 |
524 |
|
SLIGO |
132 |
479 |
|
MONAGHAN |
135 |
433 |
|
KILKENNY |
95 |
372 |
|
CAVAN |
111 |
350 |
|
LAOIS |
86 |
350 |
|
CARLOW |
87 |
326 |
|
OFFALY |
94 |
316 |
|
ROSCOMMON |
56 |
188 |
|
LONGFORD |
40 |
185 |
|
LEITRIM |
37 |
120 |
|
Grand Total |
6,389 |
25,209 |
I have been asking questions about the JobBridge scheme since it was initiated and I have yet to hear the Minister admit it has an exploitative aspect. Through its sponsorship of this scheme the State has contributed millions of free hours of labour, exploiting the 25,000 people the Minister mentioned, to companies which often gain an economic advantage over their competitors. The Minister has never owned up to the fact that companies are abusing the system. We have heard the recent furore about Advance Pitstop and other companies that have advertised JobBridge for a nine-month period. It does not take nine months to gain the experience to change an exhaust - no such thing - nor did it ever take that time to learn how to stack shelves.
The JobBridge scheme is a disgrace. It is exploitation of young, unemployed workers in particular, and it should be brought to an end and replaced with a proper internship scheme, as in other countries, which allows those who take part to gain a proper benefit from it.
I have just come from publishing our proposals in regard to the youth guarantee. Honestly, I do not understand what Sinn Féin's problem is with young people getting employment and being facilitated to get employment experience in a situation where, following the bank guarantee, which the Deputy's party supported initially, along with others, this country lost 300,000 jobs. The situation is that the finest people of all ages are locked out of employment, as the Union of Students in Ireland has said. They have good educational qualifications but, because they have no work experience, they cannot get employment.
I simply do not understand why Sinn Féin is not pro-jobs and not pro-helping people to get back to work. Up to the end of September 2013, there were an extra 58,000 people at work. That is a really good outcome. With regard to the 25,000 people who have taken up JobBridge internships, I do not know how the Deputy can argue with the fact that more than 60% of those have gone on to get further employment.
Thank you, Minister. I call Deputy Ó Snodaigh.
Not only that, but for people like construction engineers, we have sponsored back-to-education postgraduate qualifications, followed by an internship and followed by an offer of high-level employment with IT companies for two years and more. What is there to argue with on that?
There is quite a lot to argue with in terms of the Minister's policy for young, unemployed people. I can stand over our position, which is pro-jobs, and our documents on jobs attest to that. I have supported Intreo and JobsPlus but I do not support the exploitation of workers, nor have I supported the cut in training grants to young people on community employment, CE, in which the Minister was involved, nor the fact she is supporting Tús, which has no training grants, nor the jobs displacement which happens because of JobBridge.
All we need do is look at the teachers and SNAs who are now being forced into JobBridge. Each and every Government Department is abusing people by putting them into JobBridge. The Garda vetting unit is a case in point. The Minister has also planned to have local authority work done by people on a scheme without proper funding or terms and conditions. The labour movement, not the Labour Party, won those terms and conditions over many years. I am not the one who has any reason to hang my head in shame. It is the Minister, as a Labour Party Minister and somebody who in the past has espoused the virtue of proper terms and conditions in the workplace, who in government is doing the exact opposite.
Thank you, Deputy. I call the Minister.
The Minister is undermining each and every one of those terms and conditions that were won over the past 100 years. This is one of the schemes where the very same is happening.
I think the Deputy is politicking now because-----
There is no politics involved. I have a full list here if the Minister wants it.
How can he conceivably suggest, on behalf of Sinn Féin, that six months work experience for anyone who has been unemployed is somehow destructive when we have had 300,000 people in this country lose their jobs? JobBridge offers them an opportunity to hold onto their social welfare, get a top-up payment of €50 and get very valuable work experience, which the research shows, and which the Deputy knows but is not prepared to acknowledge-----
The Minister should look at the research properly and stop quoting it in the wrong.
Order, please.
-----has helped 61% of people to get into work.
There is no one way in which all of the unemployed people who are in this country will get employment; it is in a whole series of different ways. The Deputy made very disparaging comments about Tús. I travel to community centres all around this country. Let me tell the Deputy and Sinn Féin that I meet-----
I was not disparaging of Tús, just of the way the Minister operates Tús. I said nothing about the people involved in it or the people using it.
Order, please. The Minister, without interruption.
Does Deputy Ó Snodaigh just want to shout?
I do not want to shout. The Minister is misrepresenting what I said.
The Deputy is shouting.
I am not shouting. I will not come in here and be misrepresented every time.
Order, please.
He is shouting.
The Minister should conclude as she is over time.
I meet via Tús the finest people who are contributing to their local community, 7,000 at any one time, and who, thankfully, are getting employment. That is something the Deputy and I should be celebrating, not condemning.
