MAJOR problems are emerging over the application of new schemes to encourage employers to take on long term unemployed people. In some cases, they are open to abuse and in others the unemployed have difficulty retaining secondary benefits such as medical cards if they take a job.
For instance, Job start, introduced last June, and the three year old Back to Work allowance, urgently require greater co-ordination. The allowance enables people to avail of secondary benefits for three years after taking up a job, while Jobstart allows employers to claim an £80 a week subsidy for recruitment.
The allowance is administered by the Department of Social Welfare, and Job start by the Department of Enterprise and Employment. In theory, employers cannot apply for Job start if employees are availing of the Back to Work allowance and vice versa. In practice, there is nothing to prevent such arrangements.
Jobstart aims to create 10,000 jobs. At present, only a handful of employers providing fewer than 100 jobs have been approved for the scheme. The main delay is due to employers having difficulty producing tax clearance certificates to avail of the subsidy.
Meanwhile, the Minister for Social Welfare, Mr De Rossa, has contacted the Minister for Health Mr Noonan, this week seeking clarification on criteria for awarding medical cards to people on the Back to Work allowance.
His concern appears to have been prompted partly by a report in the latest issue of the INOU Bulletin, published by the Irish National Organisation of the Unemployed. It says that up to 3,090 long term unemployed people in work under job promotion schemes in the Budget have found themselves in an "administrative limbo" over medical cards.
This is in spite of the fact that the Minister for Finance, Mr Quinn, said in the Budget that they would be allowed to retain secondary welfare benefits for up to three years to ease the transformation back into the labour market.
INOU general secretary, Mr Mike Allen, said yesterday that the Department of Health had yet to change the existing procedures to accommodate the Budget changes and there might even be a question mark over its power to do so. The 1970 Health Act contains a means test provision for medical card holders.
"Health boards are responding to the debacle by simply not processing medical card renewals Mr Allen said. This left those concerned with their medical cards for the moment, but only by leaving them in an "administrative limbo". Such a stop gap response could not last for long, he said, and the organisation had written to Mr Quinn "to provide a legal and administrative basis for retention of the medical card".
Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health said yesterday that discussions had taken place with all health board chief executive officers. Arrangements have been agreed to implement the Budget provisions. She denied the Health Act posed any legal problems.
But the Department of Social Welfare said yesterday that people on the Back to Work scheme, which predates the Budget provisions, had already encountered difficulties in some health board areas, which was why Mr Dc Rossa had written to Mr Noonan on Monday.
The Fianna Fail spokeswoman on Enterprise and Employment, Ms Mary O'Rourke, accused the Government of underhand tactics and deceit on the issue yesterday. She supported the INOU call to underpin the Budget proposals with a legal and administrative base "as a matter of urgency". She is to demand an explanation from the Government when the Dail resumes tomorrow.
Part of the problem appears to be that there are now so many employment incentive schemes and they come under the rem it of at least four departments. Under the Back to Work Allowance, for instance, people are allowed to retain their secondary welfare benefits, including a medical card, for three years provided they do not earn more than £250 a week. There is a similar limit on rent and mortgage subsidies.