It will take years for the labour market to recover from the massive contraction that has taken place in the economy, a new report drawn up by the National Economic and Social council (Nesc) has stated.
The report says that there may be no net increase in the level of employment in the economy until 2013. It says that high unemployment, a significant proportion of which is long-term unemployment, make it urgent to review the supports and services in place for job-seekers.
The report says that error rather than fraud accounts for the greater part of social welfare overpayments.
It urges an improvement in welfare-to-work (or activation) strategies which it describes as being weak in Ireland in the past. However it maintains that sanctions imposed on those who refuse to take part, such as lowering or suspending payments, should be carried out in a fair and transparent manner.
Nesc also says that while the level of income support for people who are jobless for a long time are high in Ireland by international standards, this is not the case when people first become unemployed.
"A detailed analysis of replacement rates shows that the large majority of claimants on the Live Register face replacement rates that are low.
This is because the large majority of claimants are either single people or have spouses/partners still in employment whose earnings are taken into account in the household means-test and reduce the amounts of social welfare paid."
The Nesc report says that significant groups do not appear on the Live Register, notably the "unemployed self-employed" and people who have exhausted their entitlement to jobseeker's benefit and whose spouses/partners continue to earn.
It states that these aspects require changes in approach "if supports and services are to reach unemployed people and prevent them being scarred for the rest of their lives by their current unemployment".
The report points out that changes are already underway; that a major institutional reconfiguration for delivering employment services is taking place, access to further education and training for the unemployed is being facilitated in new ways, the capacity for effective activation is being developed while social welfare has been cut in some areas.
However it says that further changes should also be guided by a long-term vision of what constitutes an effective unemployment regime in a knowledge-based economy, and be imbued "with greater empathy and less suspicion towards those who have lost their jobs or the misfortune to be seeking a first one at the present time".
The Nesc report calls for the Government's new national internship programme "to be more boldly developed". It recommends that it should aim to raise "the extremely poor language skills of Irish graduates and be extended beyond the 5,000 places currently planned.
The report maintains that periods of employment on projects that result in useful outcomes and which allow unemployed people to use the skills they have while retaining their social welfare support can be beneficial in many instances for individuals and society.
However it says that the pivotal need is for greater clarity on how further schemes are to be identified and implemented, i.e., for a transparent, inclusive and speedy process.
The Nesc report says that the response of the labour market to the economic crisis to date can be fairly described as "Government-led" and department-driven".
It says that in the three years to mid 2011, six waves of significant adjustments affecting employment and unemployment policies have taken place.
"A coherent long-term strategy ensuring their consistency has been lacking; at the two extremes, some adjustments have been ad hoc and have already ended, and some have begun doing what was necessary for some time but what was lost sight of during the boom years."
The report says that in reflecting on the aggregate of responses to the unemployment crisis taken to date, it is clear that the state and its agencies cannot make the required impact on their own.
It says that what are required are measures that command such a broad base of support from stakeholders (including, vitally, unemployed people themselves) that resources are mobilised across society in a coherent and co-ordinated manner and that inputs (of expertise and time as well as financial) are made by individuals, civil society and the social partners that complement and add value to those of the state.
"The best-practice examples from other countries of lifelong learning, welfare-to-work, activation and other measures, suggest major roles for local government, education/training providers, the social partners, NGOs and for individual responsibility alongside the intelligent engagement of the state."