The Deputy has made a good case for the works needed in Carlow library. Responsibility for the capital works for libraries does not necessarily fall under one particular Department. As I said earlier, local authorities are the primary body with responsibility for them. The libraries capital programme was fully allocated when Carlow County Council applied. The current programme concludes this year and preparatory works will shortly commence on a successor programme for the following five-year period. There is a deci…

I acknowledge the work done by the more than 840 community employment schemes nationwide. CE provides vital services to local communities in areas such as the delivery of meals to older people, assisting in childcare provision and environmental work and in keeping towns and villages across the country maintained and looking well. There are more than 20,000 places available on CE, with a budget of more than €375 million in 2022 and 1,230 people are employed by schemes as supervisors and assistant supervisors. The De…

I will take the Deputy's suggestions on board in terms of the variety of tasks required of CE supervisors and assistant supervisors. It is a difficult job. We are not hiding behind a shadow-employer status. I am very much upfront in saying that the Department of Social Protection is the main funder of CE schemes and, accordingly, we need to respond to the claims of supervisors. In recent weeks and months, I have been very much trying to move things along. I am hopeful that we will make significant progress in the c…

I thank the Senator for raising the matter as it provides me with the opportunity to give some clarity on the current position relating to post-primary school provision in Clonakilty, County Cork. For school planning purposes, the Department of Education divides the country into 314 school planning areas and utilises a geographical information system to anticipate school place demand. Information from a range of sources, including child benefit data, school enrolment data and information on residential development …

I accept the Senator's point that many people do not have clarity as to their standing at this time. It is very hard to give clarity until the 15 December deadline has passed. I expect the schools have some of the information he has requested. I will feed back to the Minister that we need to get that information from the schools and give clarity to people as soon as possible. I am hopeful the fog will lift after 15 December for the students waiting for an allocation of places. I will report back to the Minister wit…

I thank the Senators for raising this matter. I am taking it on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Harris, and the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, who are unable to be here. The Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science is committed to engaging with all Departments and industry representative bodies to support them in their workforce planning needs. Officials meet regularly with colleagues in other Departments on workforce planning, particularly the Departments of Health, Chi…

I genuinely believe the Senators have hit on a crucial issue. The Minister, Deputy Harris, is committed and has made clear that planning for current and future public sector skills needs is a priority for his Department. Officials will continue to engage across Departments to progress the important area of workforce planning. I agree with the Senators' point about the HEA. We could all do with a little more information about the plan for expressions of interest in respect of therapies. It is worth pushing.

I thank the Deputy for the question. I acknowledge the work of CE supervisors. We have about 1,200 supervisors and assistant supervisors across the country. They are one of the most embedded and connected groups of community workers, broadly speaking, we have across the country. My Department has been engaging with the unions during the year. The supervisor union's representatives have engaged with the Workplace Relations Commission. The Department has been invited to the Workplace Relations Commission and I am min…

I would like to thank Senator O'Loughlin for her question on this very important issue for the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. Apprenticeship is a demand-driven educational and training programme, which aims to develop the skills of an apprentice in order to meet the needs of industry and the labour market. Apprenticeship has undergone transformation over the past six years. The importance of apprenticeships in society, both now and into the future, has never been more …

This recent data is very concerning. I spoke with an official in the Department this morning and she assured me that those people who are waiting six months and more are going to be prioritised in being moved on to the next phase of their off-site training or block release. It is important to point out that further funding of €17 million has been provided to SOLAS and the HEA to address Covid-related backlogs. Of this, €6 million is being invested in additional instructors with more than 100 additional posts approv…

I thank the Senator for raising this matter. Before I address the specific issue raised, I will provide an outline of the extent of the school transport service. The school transport scheme is a significant operation, managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department of Education. In the previous school year, 121,400 children, including 15,500 with special educational needs, were transported daily to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country. The cost of the scheme in 2021 was €289 million. The schoo…

To clarify, 24,000 additional places have been created this year. I will take the issues raised by the Senator in respect of the website back to the Department. I raised with the official today the visibility of the application process for the remote area grant, so that is now on the radar, but I will raise it with the Minister as well. The Senator's suggestion in respect of staging the payment over a couple of allocations during the year sounds like a good one as well and I will take it back to the Minister.

The Department of Transport has responsibility for overall policy on Exchequer funding regarding the national roads programme. Once funding arrangements have been put in place with TII under the Roads Act and in line with the national development plan, NDP, the planning, design, improvement and upgrading of individual national roads will be a matter for TII in conjunction with the local authorities concerned. TII ultimately delivers the national roads programme in line with Project Ireland 2040, the national planni…

Approximately €616 million of Exchequer capital funds have been provided to TII for national roads in 2022. In line with the NDP and Government policy, TII is allocating national road funding for local authorities for 2022 in a manner which seeks to achieve the following key outcomes: the protection and renewal of the existing national road network; progressing major projects in or near construction; progress of major projects that are pre-construction but well advanced in the development pipeline; and prioritising…

I will indeed.

I sincerely thank Senators Ruane, Higgins, Black and Flynn for creating the opportunity to discuss the reality of poverty. One of the challenges in tackling poverty is that it is simply not spoken about often enough in public and political discourse. I get relatively few parliamentary questions on it though it is one of the Government's most important areas of action. I am genuinely interested in hearing different perspectives and constructive suggestions on how we might tackle poverty and hope there is a way we ca…

PPS numbers are issued automatically when a birth is registered or via an application by a person who does not already have a PPS number, such as a new worker arriving into the State. On average, it takes 31 days to issue a PPS number following an application. Some 90% of applications are processed within two months. While the Department is working to reduce processing times, the time to process a PPS number has to be considered in the context of the increase in the number of applications for PPS numbers received s…

I have outlined the reaction of the Department, including increased staffing and overtime hours and moving personnel from other sections. An important message to send out today is that people who are applying should take their time. If they rush the application and get it wrong, that can delay the process significantly. People should take the time to scan the form carefully and fill it out in its entirety. In terms of the additional documents and supporting information that need to go with an application, people sh…

I am very conscious of the important role CE and other schemes play and the Minister and I want to support them as best we can. In addition to providing valuable occupational experience and training as a stepping-stone to employment for people who are unemployed, schemes such as CE also provide important, and in many cases essential, services to their local communities. Given the strong labour market performance the number of unemployed people dependent on social welfare payments continues to fall. While this is ve…

I thank the Deputy. It has been a while since there was an increase in the top-up for CE. While we would all like to have more than €5 going on it that is what we got this year. We all would have preferred more. I disagree vehemently with the assertion that CE is not fit for purpose. It is one of the most impactful and useful schemes for both individuals and communities across the country. Of all the schemes the Government supports, it is one of the best. It manages to perform two important functions. It gives peop…