THE 12-MONTH delay in allowing unemployed people to access the back to education welfare scheme is because of abuses in the past, the Dáil has heard.
Minister for Social and Family Affairs Mary Hanafin told Labour spokeswoman Róisín Shortall that "a few years ago there was serious abuse of the scheme, not let it be said by unemployed people, but by people using Ireland as a base to try to get this scheme".
Ms Shortall had questioned the "excessively restrictive" rules for the scheme under which an unemployed person has to wait at least 12 months "before being permitted to avail of the back to education allowance in order to attend a third level course".
She also insisted, during question time, that there was no justification for making an unemployed person wait 24 months before they could apply for a back to education allowance. "The qualifying criteria for these schemes were designed in a different era for a very different problem."
The Minister said "there is a justification for having timelines. For example, we don't want someone who has just completed his or her Leaving Certificate examinations drawing the dole".
Ms Shortall replied: "I'm not talking about the age limit, I'm talking about the time lag. Why do you force people to remain unemployed longer than they have to?"
Ms Hanafin pointed out that people on statutory redundancy had immediate access to the scheme, but Ms Shortall said many people did not get statutory redundancy and the Minister "is penalising them further by forcing them to wait".
The Minister stressed the importance of ensuring the scheme was "targeted. I am open to keeping this under review. We have seen abuse in the past. I am afraid that if we shorten it too much, particularly to three or four months after doing the Leaving Cert, we would end up with the wrong people getting it."
Only about 3,600 people out of 51,500 who were referred to the State training agency Fás moved on to employment, training or education schemes last year, according to Fine Gael. The party's social and family affairs spokeswoman Olwyn Enright said "that, by any measure, is a failure for an agency with a budget of €1 billion".
Ms Hanafin said of the 40,000 people referred by her department to Fás in July and August this year, "26,000 were interviewed. However, 20,000 had left the Live Register, including those who did not show for interview or who had secured employment." She agreed there was scope for more people to be interviewed and directed into training by the agency "and I intend to pursue this with them".
She pointed out that Fás undertook many training programmes "that do not involve people on the live register, including apprentices who have a particular difficulty currently".
