People Before Profit TD and spokesperson on Social Protection, Paul Murphy, has said that there will be substantial opposition to any attempt by the government to bring in a new JobBridge scheme “through the back door”.
He also pointed out that moves such as this show that the government is planning a return to austerity following the Covid crisis.
The Tallaght TD who led the ‘ScamBridge’ campaign against the previous JobBridge scheme said: “These proposals by the government to attempt to sneak in a new JobBridge programme through the back door will be opposed staunchly by me and People Before Profit.
“For the government to think that they can trick people by attempting to bring back JobBridge under another name shows us that there is a plan to turn to austerity once again following the Covid crisis, despite what they say publicly.
“JobBridge from its conception was a deeply unfair and exploitative system which was exploited by so many employers, as even the former Minister John Halligan has said. JobBridge was not about training or education, it was about forcing people to work for €1.25 an hour, driving down wages and conditions for all workers. We don’t need another one of these so-called ‘labour activation schemes’, what we need is investment in real jobs with a living wage.”