Threatened cuts to the community employment scheme and similar jobs programmes are to be strongly resisted by backbench Fianna Fáil TDs.
Fears that further cuts to the schemes will damage the party's standing with its traditional support base have been expressed by a number of TDs to Ministers.
The issue is to be debated during a series of special parliamentary party meetings planned in the run-up to next month's Budget.
Two of the party's TDs publicly urged the Government yesterday to at least maintain funding for the schemes at existing levels.
A Dublin-based deputy, Mr Eoin Ryan, said the party "should think long and hard" before allowing further cutbacks to the schemes. Clare TD Mr Tony Killeen said there was "an obvious political advantage" in continuing to support the schemes, but also a "moral onus" on the party to do so.
The Minister of State directly responsible, Mr Frank Fahey, is known to favour increasing the number of community employment scheme places from 20,000 to 25,000.
He has proposed that the job-initiative programme, which employs 2,200 formerly long-term unemployed people, be phased out gradually and absorbed into the expanded community employment scheme.
The Department of Finance is, however, understood to be against any reversal of the cutbacks to the community employment scheme, which has been halved since 1998 when it employed 40,000.
The scheme provides part-time work for long-term unemployed people aged over 25.
It was originally designed to assist long-term unemployed people get back into mainstream jobs. Over time, however, communities came to depend on services which the scheme provided, such as home helps, meals-on-wheels, childcare and environmental and heritage projects.
Mr Ryan said yesterday he had spoken to the Taoiseach and several Ministers about cuts to the scheme and he was "hopeful" his concerns would be addressed.
"Wholesale cuts in the community employment and job-initiative schemes in deprived areas can only lead to increased feelings of marginalisation. As the main Government party, Fianna Fáil has a responsibility to address such issues in a compassionate manner."
Besides providing important services, the schemes gave people a sense of purpose and belonging, he said. Cuts to the programmes would mean consigning back on to the dole people who were likely never to come off it.
Mr Killeen said people underestimated the value of the schemes, in terms of both services to the community and jobs for marginalised people who would have little alternative prospect of employment. Cutting the schemes would not be cost-effective, he added, as those affected would fall back on the social welfare system.
