Council looks to recruit staff for 208 a week

Westmeath County Council is looking to recruit 80 new staff under a scheme aimed at getting people off the dole for €208 a week.

Under the Gateway initiative run by the Department of Social Protection in conjunction with local authorities, social welfare claimants, who have been continuously unemployed for two years, are eligible for the scheme. According to the department, it selects would-be participants randomly.

If a dole claimant agrees to sign up to the scheme and is accepted after being vetted, they will receive the weekly rate of €208 (the €188 Jobseekers Allowance payment plus €20) for 19.5 hours work. Each placement lasts for 22 months. The council has already recruited a number of people under scheme, some of whom are busy tackling the county's ragwort problem.

Speaking at the September meeting of Mullingar Municipal District (MMD), which held on Monday, official David Hogan revealed that the council is looking to recruit 80 people through the scheme, 30 of whom will work in the MMD. 

Mr Hogan told the Westmeath Examiner that those recruited will mainly be doing outdoor work such as clean ups and tackling the county’s growing ragwort problem. “They will be doing work that the council does not have the resources to do,” he said.