Our communities go under the hamme

VILLAGEApril/May 

also presents a serious dilemma to the DSP

as it relies on the Local Employment Service

for a signiﬁcant part of the national employ-

ment service.

These decisions fundamentally alter the

operating environment not just for the local

development companies and local

employment-agency services, but

for all service delivery through

the Community and Voluntary

sector. The sector has already

endured severe funding cuts as

a result of the austerity budgets.

This Government has now veered

onto what can only be described

as an ideological trajectory, by

favouring the expansion of pri-

vate philanthropy/ charity and

privatisation to replace long

established, highly eﬀective,

advocacy and service organisa-

tions operating in response to

acute socio-economic needs at

local and national level.

While the senior Department

oﬃcials, backed by their respec-

tive Ministers, are pressing ahead

determinedly with the privatisa-

tion agenda in the Community

and Voluntary sector, the work-

ers, through their trade unions

and network organisations, have

been mobilising a sustained and

expanding resistance to the

change. A campaign has been

mounted to challenge any attempt to intro-

duce the privatisation of services that have

been successfully delivered for over twenty

years by community-based companies

employing thousands of workers.

The key objectives of this campaign are

to secure the employment rights and con-

ditions of community workers who are

providing essential local services, and to

prevent Government Departments from

transferring access and control of assets and

expertise created by public funds to large,

private multi-national companies, for use

primarily in boosting their prots. •

HE trend towards privatisation,

whether through outsourcing, pro-

curement, public tendering or other

means, has intensiﬁed since the period of

occupation by the Troika and the forma-

tion of the Fine Gael/ Labour government.

The negative impact on quality service pro-

vision and public-sector jobs has been well

documented. However, the imposition of

this aspect of globalisation is a relatively new

phenomenon in the community and volun-

tary sector in Ireland.

The decision by the Minister for Social

Protection (DSP) that the new JobPath

employment service should be deliv-

ered through the private sector, and the

recent announcement by the Minister for

the Environment, Community and Local

Government (ECLG) that the next Local

and Community Development Programme

will be tendered out by the Local Authorities

from January  centralises the privatisa-

tion agenda in the debate about the future of

the community and voluntary sector. Both

of these Ministerial decisions have been

shaped and determined by the views and

actions of senior Department oﬃcials.

In relation to JobPath, the DSP has argued

that it needs almost , case-workers to

respond to the current crisis of long-term

unemployment. One thousand case-work-

ers are already available in the DSP and

the community-based Local Employment

Service. However, rather than extend

this internal service they have decided to

solicit tenders from the private sector for

the additional work. This will result in the

establishment of a new employment service

with one thousand case-workers employed

by major private companies in four regions

for a period of four to six years.

This could cost up to € million. An

annual total of , people could be

referred by the DSP for compulsory inter-

view and progression. Contractors will be

paid on the basis of results in terms of sus-

tained job placements. It is envisaged that

savings in social welfare payments will cover

the cost of the new placement service.

As part of the new policy on Local

Government reform the Minister for

Environment, Community and Local

Government decided to subsume the local

development companies under the Local

Authorities. As a consequence, his senior

oﬃcials sought advice from the Attorney

General (AG) about the allocation of future

local and community development fund-

ing. The AG concluded that, as the

programme will be under Local

Authority remit, it is subject to

EU procurement Directives

requiring competitive

tender.

According to Department

oﬃcials, the tender is

open to local development

companies, not-for-proﬁt

community groups and

commercial ﬁrms that can

deliver the services under

the programme.

In a recent Dáil answer the

DSP Minister also conﬁrmed

that the AG had advised that the

Local Employment Service contract

should be put to tender next year. This

POLITICS COMMUNITIES

JobPath, local and community development and Local Employment Services go

out to tender, but workers are ﬁghting back. By David Connolly

Our communities go under

the hammer

what am I bid for support services for

communities and the unemployed?

This

Government

has now

veered onto

an ideological

trajectory by

favouring the

expansion

of private

philanthropy/

charity and

privatisation

to replace long

established,

highly eﬀective,

advocacy

and service

organisations

“