Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 4 July 2013

Public Accounts Committee

2011 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 17 - European Globalisation Adjustment Fund
FÁS Financial Statements 2012
National Training Fund

10:40 am

Photo of Simon HarrisSimon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

That is reasonable. Mr. Ó Foghlú mentioned the issue of linkages. There has been some success in finding linkages from other companies, spin-offs or spun-off areas that are adversely affected by the closure of a firm. On a cursory glance, one would be concerned to see that there were no linkages established with construction programmes. When one goes beyond a cursory look, one sees the real difficulty. The construction applications related to 3,272 different companies in the sector. I very much understand the difficulty in applying the concept of linkages. Given the particular crisis in terms of unemployment within the construction sector, has Mr. Ó Foghlú any thoughts on how linkages could possibly be formed? Do we really need to face the harsh, unpalatable reality that it is nearly impossible to apply the fund to linkages when so many smaller-scale companies are involved?

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