Mr. Geronimo Alves De Oliveira:

At the start of the pandemic, at the same time as we were hit with Brexit, I was working in a warehouse. Then I had no job and needed to go around and see what I could do. I applied to work as a carer. It is still my main job and I do 20 hours or 18 hours, sometimes on Fridays and Saturdays or overnight to help a client. Sometimes it is quite hard because if a client has to go into hospital or passes away, you do not have any hours at all and must wait from one to three months, or more, until a new client comes over and you get an increase in hours, get established and everything done and then you can relax a little and keep going.

The way we work means there are no guarantees of working hours for caregivers in Ireland. As students, we never knew what was coming. I do not know exactly what we should do but through my experience, I think we should try to see if we can establish permission for students to work for more than 20 hours. The main point is that we should allow students to work more than 20 hours. Perhaps I can do some hours here or there, or I can call somebody else to see if he or she can complete those hours a little more, perhaps 15 hours. Sometimes people - I have done this previously - work for two companies to try to make the economics come together. If you work for just one place, sometimes it cannot guarantee hours for you.