Michael D Higgins TD

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4676 Young people out of work in Galway

Issued : Monday 14 December, 2009

Michael D Higgins, Labour Party President and Dáil deputy for Galway West, has called on the government to urgently start to deal with the rising number of people who have lost their livelihoods since the beginning of the financial crisis.

Deputy Higgins said:” One out of every four young person nationwide is out of work. In all of Galway, in the county as well as the city, over four and a half thousand people under the age of 25 cannot gain employment.

“This crisis calls for imaginative and constructive leadership which the government, bluntly, is not capable of providing. Last week’s budget drove that point home yet again. The biggest gap in the budget was an absence of a coherent jobs strategy. The banking crisis, the budgetary crisis and the jobs crisis are interlinked and must be dealt with in a coherent manner.  But Fianna Fáil has been so fixated with the banks and the budget, that they have utterly neglected the jobs crisis. 

“The cost benefit analysis here is easy. Every person y off the dole is one fewer person being supported by social welfare and one more person paying into the exchequer. In our pre-budget statement, Labour identified adjustments totally €5.8billion Euro, which would allow for the €4billion adjustment in the budget deficit, while at the same time creating a Jobs Fund of at least €1150 million.  This fund would be a key component in a broader strategy to deal with the jobs crisis. 

“Labour’s objective is to re-tool the Irish economy, to wean it off its dependence on property, and return to export-led growth.  This country can be a leader in the global knowledge economy, if we take the necessary steps now to support that change. 

“There are four things that we need to do to make this change a reality: First, we need to create a structure of enterprise supports that are both wide and deep.  As the world economy begins to recover, new opportunities will open up for Irish business. 

“Second, we have to do the same for people.  It is simply economically and socially unsupportable to have more 423 000 people on the live register, with more to come next year.  We must find the means and resources to give these people opportunities to train, to learn, to gain work experience.  The sums of money involved are not great.

“Third, we need a strategy for investment – in infrastructure and in companies.  We need a new National development Plan, to match more limited resources to strategic priorities.  The Government says it has done a review.  We need more than that. 

“Fourth, we need sectoral strategies to deliver jobs.  Not everyone can or will be employed in a software firm or a high-tech start-up.  We need to ensure that job opportunities are opened up across a range of skills, and across the regions. 

“It is utterly unacceptable that so many people in Galway should not have a job. We need strategies that will build comparative advantage on the back of our natural strengths – in sectors such as Clean-tech, food and the creative industries. 

“The native creativity and genius of the Irish people is not just a cultural asset, it is an economic asset. Labour in power would seek to unlock those assets- we have done it before and we will do it again.”