THE GOVERNMENT plans to generate thousands of jobs under a new scheme involving nine departments.
Senior officials from the departments meet today to finalise a draft of the Coalition’s action plan on jobs, which will be updated once a year. The document will be presented to Cabinet in the coming weeks.
It has been prepared by Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton against a background of opposition criticism that the area of jobs was being neglected.
The document is approximately 100 pages with an emphasis on practical proposals rather than analysis of unemployment policy issues.
More than 150 specific interventions are proposed, with a specific agency or department identified as having responsibility for their implementation.
“This is not a long, discursive document like those produced in the past,” a Government source said.
“This is a list of actions, with clear monitoring and named responsibility, to be delivered by Government in 2012, to make it easier to create jobs across the economy.”
Areas on which the document concentrates include: competitiveness; indigenous start-up; growing native businesses; attracting international entrepreneurs; developing foreign direct investment and promoting community support for job-creation.
Special attention is given to opportunities in manufacturing, the green economy, health and lifesciences and cloud computing.
The proposals are aimed at removing obstacles to job creation, making it easier for businesses and entrepreneurs to employ people.They include measures to reduce the cost base for employers, minimise bureaucracy, red tape and promote easier access to finance and credit.
The meeting at Government Buildings will be chaired by an official from the Department of the Taoiseach. The group is attached to the Cabinet Committee on Economic Recovery and Jobs which will consider the draft paper on January 19th. Nine Ministers and three Ministers of State are scheduled to attend the January 19th meeting where they will have an input into the final version.
Mr Bruton is expected to seek approval for the document from the full Cabinet by the end of this month. A public launch of the initiative is due to take place shortly afterwards.
“All details, including financing, will be subject to final approval by Cabinet. The focus is on delivering the specific additional targets, in 2012, largely from within existing budget allocations,” a spokesman for the Minister said last night.
In an interview with The Irish Times, Mr Bruton said the proposal to have a new jobs plan for every year of the Coalition's term of office had come from Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
“There will be key sectors where we’re going to set out our vision for where we can build opportunities whether it be in digital gaming, financial services, the agrifood sector, the green economy, cloud computing, health and medical devices.
“There are key sectors where we have a competitive edge and the question is how do we build on that competitive advantage [and] remove obstacles that might stand in its way,” the Minister said.
“As a society and as a Government, we must become obsessed with jobs,” Mr Bruton added.
Departments at the meeting besides Mr Kenny’s and Mr Bruton’s are: Finance; Public Expenditure and Reform; Education and Skills; Social Protection; Communications, Energy and Natural Resources; Transport Tourism and Sport; Agriculture Food and the Marine.
The jobless rate in 2011 averaged 14.2 per cent, up from 13.7 per cent in 2010, 11.8 per cent in 2009 and 6.4 per cent in 2008. The standardised unemployment rate in December was 14.3 per cent, a slight fall from 14.4 per cent in November, although this has been attributed in part to a rise in emigration.
The proportion of long-term unemployed last month was 41.6 per cent, compared to 35.5 per cent in December 2010.
