Just 60 of 3,000 places filled in government's Gateway job scheme

Almost 15 months after the Government announced it in a budget speech, just 60 of the 3,000 places available on the Gateway job training scheme have been filled.

Under the initiative, dole claimants who have been on the Live Register for more than a year are paid an extra €20 per week on top of their jobseekers allowance to work for local authorities.

An average of 19.5 hours per week is on offer in areas including: village enhancement schemes; landscaping; tourism ambassadors; animal control; and libraries. Each placement lasts 22 months.

Every one of the 31 city and county councils has been given an allocation of places ranging from 55 in the likes of Co Carlow and Co Leitrim up to 215 in Cork and Fingal County Councils. Dublin City Council has the largest allocation with 295 positions.

The Department of Social Protection said it selects participants at random.

Yet of the total of 3,000 placements available, just 60 had been taken up as of February 21. And those were spread over just three local authorities, Limerick, Louth and Fingal. Limerick accounts for 47 of the places taken up so far. The other 28 local authorities had not filled a single position.

That is despite the department admitting it has already invited more than 2,500 people to participate in Gateway. A department spokeswoman admitted progress “has been slower than anticipated”.

She said the delays were “in the main related to the ongoing staff restructuring processes of county and city councils, the need to engage with stakeholders, particularly staff representative bodies and trade unions”.

It also said progress is expected to accelerate in the coming weeks.

Last month, Fianna Fáil described Gateway as a “two-year community service sentence” with people having to work almost for free or be forced off the dole.

The party’s jobs spokesman Dara Calleary said, while he believed in the need for more training and work placements to help get people off the Live Register, “this [scheme] bears all the hallmarks of another populist headline rather than a useful initiative that will actually get people back to work”.