Children and Youth Affairs: Strategy for Combatting Youth Unemployment 8th July 2013

QUESTION NOS:   27 & 249
DÁIL QUESTIONS addressed to the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs (Ms. Fitzgerald)
by Deputies
for ORAL ANSWER on 04/07/2013  

*   To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the extent to which her Department continues to monitor the issue of youth unemployment with particular reference to the creation of the necessary training, up-skilling or educational options available or likely to become available; and if she will make a statement on the matter.

                                                                                                                                                                                – Bernard J. Durkan

For WRITTEN answer on Thursday, 4th July, 2013.
 
     
REPLY.

The Government is tackling unemployment generally through the twin strategies of the Action Plan for Jobs and Pathways to Work and other measures to support employment growth. My Department works closely with the Departments of Education and Skills, Social Protection, Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and others as part of a cross departmental effort   to realise these Government objectives.  

Youth unemployment is a particular concern because of the prospects it holds for young people themselves, their personal development and for social inclusion. The Government has a range of measures in place to tackle youth unemployment and these include programmes and initiatives in education, training, job search assistance/ work experience and to encourage job creation.    

Through the Action Plan for Jobs, my Department is progressing work   in relation to actions outlined for my Department and is firmly committed to maximising the role the youth sector can play in this area. There is growing recognition in Ireland and across Europe of the potential of youth work services to enhance employability of young people.   In particular, recent European policy developments suggest that youth work has the potential to do more and has a special relevance for those young people who are marginalised from traditional systems of education, employment and training.

Ireland’s EU Youth Presidency Programme sought to maximise the potential of youth policy in addressing the goals of the Europe 2020 Strategy and aimed to highlight how youth policy, as expressed through quality youth work and youth activities, can do more to enhance a range of life skills including employability. Council Conclusions, adopted by the Education, Youth, Culture and Sport Council at their meeting on 16 May 2013, which I chaired, propose actions to maximise the potential of youth policy in addressing the goals of Europe 2020, in particular youth employment.   A second set of Conclusions, also adopted, highlight the importance of quality youth work as a tool for engagement with, and development of, young people. EU Youth Ministers further reaffirmed the relevance of quality youth work in contributing to measures to enhance the employability of young people, in particular those not engaged in education, employment or training.

As a follow-up to these Conclusions, I hosted a two day informal expert roundtable on the 20th and 21st June which considered the contribution of youth work to youth employment.   The outcome of the meeting, the Dublin Declaration, recognises the challenges facing young people in Europe as a result of the lack of jobs and work experience, as well as the challenges posed by the widening gap between skills being sought by certain employers and those held by many prospective employees. It recognises that youth work offers a significant infrastructure, reach and capacity, outside of formal education and training; and therefore can play a highly-relevant role in developing young people’s skill-sets, in particular with respect to ‘soft’ skills such as learning to learn, social and civic competence, leadership, communication, teamwork, and entrepreneurship €“ all of which are highly-valued and sought-after by employers. The Declaration notes the centrality of the role of quality youth work in the implementation of the Youth Guarantee by Member States.

The Conclusions of the Ministers and the outcome of the expert group meeting provide the basis for an ambitious agenda which can greatly enrich the national and European Union’s policy responses to youth employment. My Department is working closely with the Departments of Education, Social Protection and Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, to identify, in what ways, the youth sector can contribute to these shared policy objectives, in particular with respect to the potential of non-formal learning to reach out to those young people not in education, training and employment and to measures to implement the Youth Guarantee. The National Youth Work Advisory Committee, whose members include representatives of voluntary youth work organisations, is also considering issues to do with progressing this important agenda for our   young people.