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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
November 2014 17
experiencing literacy, homelessness, addic-
tion, domestic-violence, and mental health
issues) are the most likely to experience
sanctions.
This raises questions about the ethics
of such activation regimes, reinforces the
necessity of monitoring the new regime, and
underscores the need to advocate to support
those vulnerable to sanctions. Irish society
needs to publicly debate issues of sanctions,
when they are reasonable and who should
determine their application.
There is international evidence that ‘pay
by results’ contracts can push claimants
into low-paid, low-quality and temporary
employment. This leads to recycling claim-
ants into patterns of ‘low pay, no pay’, as
they move between poor-quality employ-
ment and welfare. ‘Pay by results’ contracts
can of course require quality, ‘sustaina-
ble’ outcomes but the JobPath contracts
appear ambiguous on this. Payment to the
contractors is conditional on sustainable
employment outcomes but a series of tempo-
rary job contracts qualifies as a ‘sustainable
employment outcome’. Again, this needs to
be monitored.
The design of JobPath, based on a ‘work
first’ model, means the private-sector com-
pany or the individual claimant involved will
T
HE Department of Social Protection
has contracted two private companies
to deliver JobPath, a new activation
programme for Ireland’s 178,000 long-term
unemployed. This follows a tendering proc-
ess supported by the Centre for Economic
and Social Inclusion in London.
A British recruitment firm, Seetec, has
been contracted to deliver these activation
services in the north of the country and
Dublin. An Turas Nua, a consortium of Irish-
based recruitment company FRS and the UK
company Working Links, will run the pro-
gramme in the south of the country.
It is understood that each contractor must
service 25,000 long-term unemployed peo-
ple a year in their search for employment.
They will do this through a supply chain of
sub-contracted local, private and not-for-
profit, specialist organisations.
We need more scrutiny on the motiva-
tions behind this decision and its possible
consequences.
The explicit driver for this partial priva-
tisation of Irish public employment services
is the inability of existing public services to
support large numbers of long-term unem-
ployed people back into the labour market.
Certainly, in a context of wide-ranging insti-
tutional and policy reform in labour-market
activation, there are significant capacity
issues such that the long-term unemployed
and working-age social-welfare claim-
ants outside the live register have not yet
been targeted by activation programmes.
However, we need to be mindful that, else-
where, such privatisation has been at least
partially motivated by the desire to imple-
ment sanctions-driven ‘pay by result’
regimes which many public-sector and not-
for-profit organisations have been reluctant
or unable to deliver.
Activation policy now appears to be mov-
ing towards a ‘work first’ model that stresses
job-search assistance with less emphasis
on education and training. In many similar
‘work first’ and ‘pay by result’ régimes the
most vulnerable of welfare claimants (people
directly pay for the option of training or edu-
cation. This will likely mean fewer people
being supported in education and training
and a re-orientation to short-term and more
vocational training. There will be less invest-
ment in options with potential
to realise better long term sus-
tainable individual, societal and
even economic outcomes.
There remains a significant
challenge to facilitate access
to activation supports (includ-
ing childcare) to lone parents,
people with disabilities and
those who have been without
employment for three years
or more. The role of the Local
Employment Service needs to
be clarified on this, as does the
future capacity of the statu-
tory activation service Intreo
to meet the needs of the long-
term unemployed.
JobPath is just another
in st a nce of a w i de r t re nd t ow a rd s
privatisation of what were pre-
viously public services.
From refuse services to com-
munity development to home
care, many public services
are now to be delivered by pri-
vate for-profit actors. These
changes have ostensibly hap-
pened as discrete individual
decisions, sometimes for prag-
matic reasons.
However, collectively, this pattern has a
deep impact on what we understand as citi-
zenship. It has practical effects that are often
felt most by the vulnerable and powerless.
This level of privatisation needs careful
public monitoring and debate. We need to
be vigilant to the intended and unintended
cumulative consequences of this creeping
privatisation. •
Dr Mary P Murphy lectures in the Department
of Sociology, Maynooth University
While public services haven’t targeted the long-term unemployed their
privatisation betrays an agenda to sideline education and training.
By Mary Murphy
Privatisation kicks in, quietly
and unquestioned
In many similar
‘work first’
and ‘pay by
result’ régimes
the most
vulnerable
(those with
literacy,
homelessness,
addiction and
domestic-
violence,
issues) are the
most likely to
experience
sanctions
“
still alive
JOBPATH NEWS
