Social employment schemes do not significantly improve people's chances of getting a job, according to a new report on labour market policies from the Economic and Social Research Institute.
The study, entitled Working Schemes?, says that only training courses which give people vocational skills in demand on the labour market seriously enhance their chances of obtaining a job.
Its authors, Dr Philip J. O'Connell and Ms Frances McGinnity, say that while initiatives like the Community Employment schemes may be socially useful they are not effective tools for bringing unemployed people into the mainstream labour market.
However, the State training agency FAS strongly contests the findings of the study. It says the data used are three years old and do not reflect significant recent changes in FAS courses.
It also argues that because the data concentrate on the young unemployed, aged under 23, they do not reflect the overall picture.
The study looks at 3,200 participants in various FAS-sponsored courses and compares their success in finding jobs with 500 unemployed people who did not attend courses. It is the first comparative study of FAS courses and how they affect the employment prospects of the trainees.
It found that specific skill-training programmes greatly enhanced the chances of people finding a job, but participation in what it terms direct employment schemes - such as the old Social Employment Scheme (SES), its successor the Community Employment (CE) programme and Youthreach - do not show a statistically significant improvement in the job prospects of participants, compared with other unemployed people.
Dr O'Connell said at the introduction of the report yesterday: "There are many people out there who can benefit from basic training. But a series of linked programmes are needed so that ultimately they can progress into courses that are market-relevant."
A FAS spokesman, Mr Gregory Craig, said afterwards that the agency welcomed the study. It confirmed the value of the Specific Skills Training, which is the largest single FAS programme.
Turning to the more critical analysis of FAS's direct employment schemes, Mr Craig said Youthreach was being reassessed with a view to ensuring a progression by participants to the Specific Skills Training programme or formal education.
He said that the data referred to the Social Employment Schemes. This had been replaced by Community Employment, where job placements rates were double those under the SES.