An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-14
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Micheál Martin (FF), Cork South-Central

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. Youth unemployment is a seasonal and volatile issue.
One of the areas we need to examine more closely is the cost involved for SMEs generally and whether young people are being taken on, even on a part-time. There has been a cumulative increase in costs over quite a while. We will do everything we can to support young people's progression into employment. In June, the youth unemployment rate was 10.8%, up from 9.8% in May and down from 11.6% in June of last year. It is always traditionally higher than the overall unemployment rate. We have to keep an eye on the graduate unemployment issue as well. There are changes occurring. It was interesting yesterday to hear about the additional €5 billion investment by Intel. The company is putting that down to AI having a huge impact on the semiconductor sector. There will be gains and potential reductions as well in various sectors of the economy.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-07-14/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:08+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-14