Mr. Fergal O'Brien:

I wish to address one or two of Senator Quinn's comments. The comment about the need for Irish business and workers to show spirit in terms of getting over this thing is laudable. One thing we have noticed in many of our member companies, especially dating back to 2009 and 2010 when the decline was at its most dramatic, was the degree to which there were genuine local partnerships between businesses and their employees to try to put right many of their problems. We saw remarkable efforts to change and certain developments that would not have taken place in a decade before the crisis occurred in the space of six months. There was an exceptional spirit. We studied how companies were able to increase their productivity in particular through ambitious, focused change management programmes. That spirit is still in place in many companies and it has been shown in recent years.

There is still a real challenge in the domestic economy relating to demand. We saw this in the case of exporters. They have had cost problems, especially with the United Kingdom because we became very expensive compared to the UK. This was the case for companies working in markets where they knew demand existed if they could only become competitive again. They delivered exceptional change and productivity improvements. If a company implemented such change in the domestic economy it could probably get more business but, unfortunately, such a company is probably getting that business at the expense of another small business elsewhere. This does not mean the display of such spirit will not improve the viability of one's business, whether one is an exporter or working in the domestic economy.

There is an issue with disincentives to work and social welfare payments. Hardly a week goes by in IBEC when we do not hear from someone in a company who informs us that he offered a job to a certain person or number of people but they would not take the job because they said they would be better off on social welfare. There is a complex dynamic in terms of what causes it.