Mr. Kevin Sherry:

On the issue of the awareness of companies, we have seen a shift in recent months in companies that are not only more aware but are moving to take action. For us, the big concern was companies doing evaluations and becoming aware but not taking action. Action is key in responding in advance of March 2019. We had a workshop in Portlaoise last week which 79 companies attended. Change has taken place over the recent months on that.

We are very grateful for the substantial additional resources received from the Department, which we needed to help companies. I will add one caveat which is that there is an issue associated with larger companies looking to make big investments but being restricted by state aid rules. There are larger companies that employ more than 250 people which need to make big capital investments in order to redirect their energies. An example is companies in the dairy industry that are producing a lot of product. State aid rules restrict the support we can provide for them. From Enterprise Ireland's perspective the introduction of the guaranteed loan scheme which will be operational from next month is a very important development.

I will answer the question about whether we are losing other opportunities as a result of the focus on Brexit in two ways. In 2015, the growth rate of exports to the UK by Irish companies was in the order of 12% and in 2016 it was 2%. We have seen a drop in realising potential opportunities in the UK, by currency and also by market demand. That is a lost opportunity as a result of Brexit. We are accelerating efforts with companies to capitalise on opportunities in other markets. That is very important in terms of lessening their dependence. Similar to the IDA, Brexit is a very important part of the day job for Enterprise Ireland. That is a reality and we have to deal with it.