More than half the jobs offered on the Student Summer Job Scheme are being left unfilled, according to a new USI survey which blames low pay and limited hours.

The scheme was introduced back in the grey days of 1993 and high unemployment. Depending on who you believed, it was an effort to stop idle students sponging off the State or an effort to massage the jobless figures.

Either way, more than 9,000 places were offered in the first year, and more than 7,000 places were taken up.

At the time, USI were vociferous in their opposition to the scheme, terming it "the most ill-prepared, anti-social and uncaring cutback by any government for many, many years". Now, however, the union finds itself defending it from a Government which, according to USI Welfare Officer Cian O'Callaghan, is "allowing the scheme to die a slow death". The survey, based on responses from 200 organisations who had employed students, showed very high levels of satisfaction with both the amount and quality of work done by the students.

Despite this feedback, the wage for those on the scheme has remained at £3 since 1995, and this is believed by those surveyed to be a major factor in the scheme's decline.

Fully 43 per cent said they felt the wage level was the single most important factor . Eleven per cent felt that the limited number of hours permitted by the scheme was important. A curmudgeonly 6 per cent believed the main cause of the slump was a "decline in interest amongst students in the community". More than half of the sponsors felt that the most important reform the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs could carry out would be to increase pay rates. There was also substantial support (nearly 20 per cent) for the suggestion that students be allowed to work elsewhere as well. Fifteen per cent of those questioned also felt that an increase in the number of hours allowed under the scheme would make a difference.

O'Callaghan said he agreed with all these suggestions but that "each year brings more and more restrictions. They change the dates that people can work and they say people can't do additional work.

"It does have an educational benefit and it is good for students to benefit from that kind of work."

USI president Philip Madden said that the wage issue was very important, contrasting the £3 figure with the proposed national minimum wage of £4.40.

"To refuse to pay students the statutory minimum wage is to deny them basic rights and to devalue the important community work they undertake under the scheme," he said.

For its part, the Department seems to take it as a good sign that places on the scheme are being unfilled, as it means the students are finding better jobs on their own.

A spokesman for the Department said demand for places under the scheme has been steadily declining over the past three years. Last year the number of applications was down 24 per cent on 1998, while the number of students who actually took part in the scheme declined by 32 per cent. Abolishing the means test is also out of the question because to do so "would change the whole nature of the scheme and would impact on the resources available to help those students who need it most".