THE GOVERNMENT has begun cutting the benefits of unemployed people who refuse to take up reasonable job or training offers.
The Department of Social Protection and the Revenue Commissioners have also agreed a strategic plan to tackle welfare fraud and the growing “black economy”.
Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton said yesterday seven people have had their benefits cut under legislation introduced in January to encourage people to come off benefits and get back to work. She said it was something she was “not particularly happy about doing” but it was an appropriate policy if people refused reasonable offers of work.
The “work for dole” scheme is intended to encourage people to come off benefits and engage in training or work placements to help them get back into the workforce. It was announced in last December’s budget.
In recent weeks the department has begun to use its new powers to dock the welfare of those who are refusing to properly engage with the State’s employment services.
The department has applied eight penalty rates, of which seven are still in place, and is reviewing a number of other cases.
Five of the cases involve people on jobseeker’s allowance, who have recently had their welfare reduced by €44 per week to €144.
One 19-year-old had their jobseeker’s allowance cut by €25 to €75 per week and two people on jobseeker’s benefit have had their welfare rates reduced by €44 and €34.30.
Under previous legislation the Government could suspend a jobseeker’s benefit altogether rather than reduce welfare rates.
But in practice this was rarely done as it could leave people effectively destitute.
Ms Burton also said she would put in place a new strategic fraud and control plan to tackle welfare fraud and the black economy following a meeting yesterday with the Revenue Commissioners.
This would identify the sectors of the economy and welfare schemes most at risk from fraud and investigate where there was a risk of concurrent working and claiming social welfare. It would also ensure an integrated approach to prevention, deterrence and detection of social welfare abuses, she said in a statement.
The Revenue Commissioners recently warned one of the biggest risks in the recession was the growing “shadow economy” and an under-declaration of income.
Asked if stiffer penalties were needed to tackle welfare fraud, Ms Burton said people were being prosecuted for welfare fraud and she wished the same were true of the people in charge of the banks, who had “caused the economic collapse in this country”.
“I think changes as to how we prosecute social welfare would have to be accompanied by an equal zeal to change the law in relation to white-collar crime,” she said.
Ms Burton attended the launch of a report by the Economic and Social Research Institute yesterday, which was strongly critical of the State’s past efforts in supporting jobseekers to get back into work.
The report found State agencies tasked with encouraging and assisting the jobless to return to work had limited success and are in some cases counterproductive.
Fás “activation interviews” with jobseekers were found to negatively affect job prospects, with the chances of entering employment being about 17 per cent lower for those who went through the interview process, it said.
Ms Burton said there needed to be a change in “mindset and culture” in the agencies helping people to get back to work.
“It is important that it has been published and we learn the lessons from this report. We are going to bring the employment side of Fás into the employment side of the Department of Social Protection,” said Ms Burton. She said a lot of changes had taken place within Fás and the Department of Social Protection since the study took place.
She said a new national employment and entitlement service should be operating within a year. “I think the people who work in Fás are anxious and eager to do that and are quite capable of doing it when they join the department.”