Rural jobs plan ‘will boost places in CE schemes’

THE new rural employment scheme announced in the Budget will go a long way to quelling objections from Fianna Fáil backbenchers about falling numbers in Community Employment Schemes.

In his first detailed response to the new scheme, the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs Eamon Ó Cuiv, told the Irish Examiner that the 2,500 places on the scheme would mean that many schemes in rural Ireland faced with shutdown would now be in a position to continue. Mr Ó Cuiv also argued that the scheme, which will be part-time, would address a fundamental anomaly in CE schemes as they applied to small farmers.

The purpose of CE schemes include a training function designed to help unemployed people return to full-time work.