LONG TERM JOBLESS FIGURES 'A SERIOUS CONCERN'

29 Jun 2011

Congress has said that Government must target the long-term unemployed with a specific reskilling programme following confirmation that the numbers out of work for a year or more continues to rise.

Congress Economic Advisor Paul Sweeney said: "The CSO figures show that the numbers of long-term unemployed have risen by 10,000 in the last month and now constitute almost 41% of those out of work. That means we have a very serious problem in the Irish jobs market and the wider economy, a problem that requires urgent attention.

"Long-term unemployment is corrosive of individual and community well-being. We need to target the problem with serious programmes of reskilling and retraining. We believe there is an unanswerable social and economic case to take money from the National Pension Reserve to specifically fund a reskilling programme for the long term unemployed," Mr Sweeney said.