DEVELOPING effective social policies to combat unemployment and social exclusion are as vital to building a competitive economy as tax and economic reforms, says IBEC.
The Irish Business and Employers Confederation criticises the education system, social welfare and State employment schemes for failing disadvantaged groups in our society as well as the needs of Irish business.
These are among the main points in a major IBEC policy document, "Social Policy in a Competitive Economy", which was released yesterday.
In it, for the first time, Irish employers commit themselves to the concept of the "social market". They accept that a "reasonable balance" must be achieved between economic priorities and creating greater social equity.
However IBEC's director of social affairs, Mr Declan Madden, says any future social legislation must be shown to be "really needed and that its objective cannot be achieved by other means."
IBEC will also want to know what such legislation would cost, and its effect on competitiveness, particularly of small firms.
"If, at that stage, a decision is made to introduce the measure, IBEC will want to know what parallel measures are being proposed to balance the increased costs being posed."
Launching the document, the chairman of IBEC's social policy committee, Mr Domhnall MacDomhnaill, said: "Social policy is important because it embraces a range of issues which account for significant amounts of State expenditure and influences the values that we, as a society, support.
"This IBEC policy document is about establishing a reasonable balance between the requirements to create a competitive economy and the need to ensure that people who are disadvantaged are treated fairly, that they are given the wherewithal to live with dignity and the opportunity to play an active part in social and economic life."
Turning to specific areas, the IBEC document says that the education system is failing to develop "key qualities such as self motivation, a commitment to ongoing learning, initiative and creativity" among students. It is particularly failing the needs of slow learners and early schoolleavers.
While IBEC welcomed recent initiatives, more needed to be done and "any spare or additional teaching resources should be targeted at disadvantaged students at an early stage."
There was also an "urgent" need to improve standards in modern continental languages and students' oral and written communication skills in English and mathematics.
Employers have an important role to play in promoting equality in the labour market, says IBEC. It intends establishing various pilot projects in member companies to examine practical problems such as occupational segregation, participation by the disabled in working life, and improving the skills of low paid workers.
However, "a reasonable balance must be achieved between the increased costs, complexities and rigidities" attached to equality legislation, "and the positive impact for existing employees", says IBEC.
At present there are 30 substantial pieces of legislation governing employment. These make recruitment complex and at times impossible, especially for small firms, it says.
IBEC calls for employers to be given greater control over training their workers. Increased State funding to kick start training at enterprise level" is needed.
General training programmes for the unemployed "are of little or no benefit in improving their chance of re entering the labour market, says the IBEC document. The specific skills programme has had a much more impressive record for making individuals "employment ready".
However, it welcomes the establishment of the Local Employment Service (LES) this year and says it must "take what ever action is required to best meet the needs of individual unemployed people."