The Comptroller and Auditor General has presented a highly critical report into FÁS's administration of its Competency Training Programme to the Public Accounts Committee.
The programme ran from 2003-08 at a cost of €126m. The funding was provided by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Information, but it is expected that about €56m will be refunded by the European Social Fund.
The C&AG's report found that there had been gaps in the monitoring of the training delivered by external training providers. Around half of the courses reviewed had not received a monitoring visit.
There were also difficulties in assessing the results of the training, as FÁS had not collected all the necessary information. In particular, the extent to which participants achieved certification was not recorded.
In four years of rapid expansion, training was provided to more than 100,000 participants. The aim of the programme was to upskill workers who already had jobs, to give them portable skills, during a period of full employment.
At the end of the meeting, committee chairman Bernard Allen said he was disappointed in the explanations given by FÁS, because it sounded very much like the old FÁS.
However, FÁS management insisted that while they acknowledged their ‘legacy issues’ they had learned from the past and were acting on the lessons learned.
Earlier, there was strong criticism of the Department of Enterprise Trade and Employment for taking five years to complete value for money report of less than 200 pages in relation to the training programme.
The Secretary General of the Department, Seán Gorman, accepted that it looked bad that it had taken so long to complete a report that he himself had ordered.
The committee heard that a former principal officer in the Department, Pat Hayden, had resigned in protest at the length of time it was taking to complete the report.
Labour's Róisín Shorthall said it was surprising that a principal officer expressed serious reservations but the Secretary General apparently did nothing to address that officer's concerns.
In reply to Mr Allen, Mr Gorman denied that there was any effort to bury the report, or to cover or suppress anything.
