MINISTER FOR Integration Conor Lenihan has stressed the need to provide retraining for unemployed immigrants with the latest figures showing foreign nationals are far more likely than their Irish counterparts to lose their jobs in the economic downturn.
Mr Lenihan met senior Fás officials yesterday to discuss how to respond to the major increase in unemployment among immigrants here.
He said recent figures showed there were 71,716 foreign nationals on the Live Register last month, an increase of 141 per cent since February last year. By comparison, the rise among the Irish population was 77 per cent over the same 12-month period.
“The increasing level of unemployment is a major cause of concern and is seriously affecting both Irish and migrant communities,” Mr Lenihan said after the meeting.
“Non-Irish nationals represent an estimated 16 per cent of all persons in the labour force aged between 17 and 65 but they now represent 20.2 per cent of all persons on the Live Register. These people have worked and paid their taxes in Ireland and have contributed to our economy. Just like Irish people, they do not want to be signing on and they are eager to get back to work.”
Mr Lenihan yesterday also defended the Government’s announcement this week that more than 500 teachers who provide language support to foreign nationals will lose their jobs as a result of budget cutbacks.
“Nobody is delighted about these cutbacks, and certainly we regret having to make them. But it is necessary in the current economic and financial environment. In 2002, we had 300 language support teachers. We now have just short of 2,000. And quite clearly, that resource would have to have been looked at anyway, whether there was a recession or not,” Mr Lenihan said.
He was speaking at the launch of an information pack for schools on asylum and immigration in the EU. The pack, which was produced by the UN refugee agency and the International Organisation for Migration, can be downloaded at www.unhcr.ie.