The virtual abandonment by the Irish state of any responsibility for the waves of emigrants in much of the last century should now inspire a more focussed and positive response to recommendations contained in the report on Youth Emigration launched by the National Youth Council of Ireland, MEP Marian Harkin has said.
Launching the report Independent MEP urged the government to acknowledge its duty to emigrants and in particular to accept the recommendations to have a Junior Minister given responsibility for emigrants.
She said: “The opportunity now exists to provide valuable low cost ‘in time’ supports to our emigrants which, to be fully effective, will need a co-ordinating influence at Ministerial level. Most of the recommendations in the National Youth Council’s report can be implemented immediately, or within a short time, as they require very few resources.
“In particular there is a need for a one stop shop web portal which can guide emigrants on issues such as qualifications needed or special requirements for entry into particular professions applicable in different countries. Access to health services where immediate registration with a GP is necessary in order to avoid months of delay to obtain services is an important issue which needs to be highlighted.
“The current wave of emigration emphasises once more the need to focus much more on language teaching at all education levels. Languages are now a basic requirement and will be for the future with the recovery of EU economies providing jobs opportunities relatively close to home.”
She added: “Current emigration is taking large numbers of highly qualified young people out of the country and it is imperative that contact is maintained with them. We hear almost on a daily basis of jobs being filled in Ireland by qualified immigrants. It will be vital to maintain a flow of information to our emigrants indicating to them that experience gained abroad could qualify them for jobs at home.
“A comprehensive well maintained website would be hugely important in this respect and would be of great assistance to emigrants seeking information on jobs and skills needed back home as national economic recovery occurs.
“A significant and long overdue way of maintaining contact with our emigrants would be to enjoin them in our electoral processes. Expat voting is a feature of the electoral systems of many countries and at least the opportunity to participate in reformed Seanad elections would be an acknowledgement of their continued membership of the Irish nation.”