Cabinet agrees job creation plan

The Government has today agreed on a range of measures designed to boost job creation which will be included in the 2013 Action Plan for Jobs to be published next month.

A special Cabinet meeting on jobs discussed proposals from each Minister on the jobs issue but the meeting was dismissed as a stunt by the Opposition.

A Government spokesman said that the measures agreed by the Cabinet would be included in the 2013 Action Plan.

The spokesman added that the Government was determined to create the conditions in which employment could grow and the measures agreed  would contribute to that process.

Fianna Fáil spokesman on jobs Dara Calleary dismissed the meeting as a public relations stunt rather than the radical charge of direction by the Government that was required to tackle the unemployment crisis.

"The 423,733 people on the live register are sick of well-dressed announcements, high profile launches and spin-steeped plans that amount to little in reality. All they want is action that provides them with real opportunities to get back to work," he said.

Mr Calleary added that if the meeting was actually about more than optics it amounted to a damning indictment of the Government that it had taken them nearly two years to realise such a meeting was necessary.

"It is clear that the series of repackaged jobs initiatives have not worked and that there is not a coordinated approach between Government Departments on tackling the crisis. More worryingly, the rate of long-term unemployment has continued to rise over the past two years with the number of people in long-term unemployment now accounting for 60 per cent of all of those out of work," he added.

Earlier Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the level of unemployment in Ireland and Europe was "unacceptable". He was speaking at Tayto Park in Ashbourne Co Meath where he announced the creation of 78 new jobs.

The "real priority here is to grow the economy", Mr Kenny said. He said this would "underlay and provide the foundation" that would result in "strategies and schemes that would result in jobs being created".

He said "the action plan for jobs being overseen by the Minister for Enterprise is developed by the strategy to grow the economy". Mr Kenny said in growing the economy jobs would then arise "in a whole range of areas".