Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy has raised a number of points in his contribution to which I will seek to respond. The review of the apprenticeship scheme drew together people from all relevant areas. The apprenticeship scheme collapsed because it was excessively reliant on the construction sector and was no longer fit for purpose. This is the reason the Minister for Education and Skills decided to undertake a major programme of reform. The report has been published and the Minister is moving to implement the recommendations of that review. The approach to apprenticeship will be simplified and includes shortening the necessary duration of apprenticeships and making the scheme more user-friendly for employers. The range of skill types will be expanded for which apprenticeships could be developed. The scheme had been too narrow in its focus, and was inflexible. It will continue to be regulated by statute but the aim is to make it more flexible and useable. It is complemented by other SOLAS developments which include traineeships.

As employers emerge from a pretty difficult environment, the long-term commitment to apprenticeship is the long-term ideal. In the shorter term, traineeships are a more flexible instrument and these will probably attract more participation. The Minister for Education and Skills is seeking to put in place a range of measures, not unlike our access to finance challenge, in order to meet different needs of the market place, such as Momentum and Springboard programmes as well as apprenticeships and traineeships. SOLAS is charged with the implementation of a spectrum of options.

I do not accept the Deputy's point that access to finance has not improved dramatically. It is easy to criticise schemes like microfinance and the loan guarantee for not achieving the desired results. However, these were under consideration during the Deputy's time in government and they were never implemented. We have acknowledged that these innovations need to be tested and amended. We will be bringing the report on the credit review group before the joint committee very shortly and we will bring forward heads of legislation for consultation with the committee. We have ambitions to expand microfinance. A total of 240 loans have been approved, totalling €3.8 million, which is a 54% approval rate. The credit guarantee is currently €11.6 million in 88 facilities. These schemes have had a very tangible impact on jobs in that they are helping to increase employment by 445 and to maintain employment in the case of 276. Over 700 jobs are either in place or are protected and these have been saved by the loan guarantee scheme. We can do better by amending the scheme. As Deputy Calleary rightly says, this is one of the new instruments at the disposal of the local enterprise offices when dealing with clients. We are considering amendments to the seed capital scheme, which is a very generous tax break for start-up companies for former PAYE workers who start up companies, but the scheme has not been taken up to a degree. Crowd financing is also included in the pre-budget assessment to ascertain whether changes may be required to make crowd finance more acceptable.

The Commission has an interest in tax policy but it does not arise in the context of the country-specific recommendations. Member states retain rights as to taxation. The Department of Finance and ECOFIN would be better sources of information with regard to tax. Work is ongoing on other issues such as equity finance, retail bonds, working capital for exports and a range of elements to be put in place. At this stage we are not far off €3 billion in new funding sources which were not in place three years ago. These range from microfinance, the loan guarantee scheme, the new national NPRF funds, the continuing development of the seed and venture fund and the strategic investment bank. In consultation with Enterprise Ireland, we are seeking to find out where SMEs are encountering particular difficulties in order to position funds with appropriate partners. This is a smart way of using our money. For example, in the seed and venture fund we put up €1 which attracts a further €3 from the private sector, which amounts to a fund of €4 for our €1. That fund provides finance to businesses and brings domain expertise in the sector in which the businesses operate. The development capital fund has seen a number of interesting players in that area. Some very prominent Irish companies are getting behind those development capital funds and bringing their expertise and access to finance to bear and to help the growth of companies. We are building a range of options. Not all schemes do as well as they might but that is to be expected with innovation.