Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The emphasis of the meeting is on competitiveness and jobs growth. I welcome Mr. Shanahan's comments that Ireland has areas which require attention and improvement. Recently, this committee travelled to Waterford, where I am from. We decided the committee would visit the regions for perhaps one visit per quarter. As my colleagues will testify, there is a Limerick bias on the committee, with four members from Limerick, and that is just the way the cards fell. However, we also feel that a lot of the information we are getting is a Dublin narrative. I felt it was important that we would get out into the regions. We paid a visit to Waterford and ten Oireachtas Members attended what was a very worthwhile meeting. As Mr. Shanahan will be aware, unemployment figures for Waterford and the south east are, unfortunately, 2.5% above the national average and they have remained stubbornly higher than all other areas.

Several issues were raised at that meeting. There is no doubt the IDA has had a bumper five years and it has added in excess of 50,000 net new jobs but, unfortunately, as we heard at the meeting, only 457 of those jobs, or less than 1%, came to the south east. According to the figures I have, the south east is home to 11% of the population. We have to contrast this with the transformative performance in Limerick. Do not get me wrong; I welcome all the business that is being received in Limerick. Unfortunately, however, despite the work of those involved in the south-east action plan for jobs, with whom we spent a lot of time, and who are doing fantastic work and are great industry champions, they are still falling short of their own targets.

I want to highlight the point raised by Deputy Eugene Murphy in regard to IDA visits. I know an IDA visit does not mean there will be a company there afterwards, but the figures I received from the previous Minister were from January to September and showed only two visits to Wexford. I was astonished that, with Brexit looming, there would not be more emphasis on the port of Rosslare. We had six visits to Kilkenny, seven to Carlow, seven to Tipperary and nine to Waterford, despite the south east being known for having the highest unemployment. I know we have come from a very high base and I know huge work is being done in the pharma area. However, what focuses my mind, and I have raised this on several occasions, is that the south east returns just 45% of PAYE income tax per head and just 40% of VAT per head according to Revenue figures for 2016. This shows that we have jobs, but low paying jobs. When the PAYE return is 45% per capitathere and 100% in other areas, it shows something is not working. My husband works in Bausch & Lomb. Genzyme is located there and West Pharma will soon be open, so I know good work has been done. We need to do more, however.To go back to what Deputy Murphy said, some areas are doing extremely well. I know the IDA cannot pick them and land them where we want to put them, as there are other regions involved. A huge amount of our discussion was spent around the technological university and the fact we do not have one in the south east, but that Bill is now moving through the Dáil, which is fantastic. I would appreciate it if Mr. Shanahan could refer to some of those issues.