Mr. Damian Duggan:

On the legislation, I had a lady working for me for a few years and she informed me that she wanted to take two years out for carer's leave. At the time, I did not know anything about carer's leave but I learned that I was legally obliged to allow her to take it and I also had to keep her job open for her. As such, I could not offer her replacement permanent employment. As this lady was expecting a baby, she also took a break in carer's leave and went on maternity leave and was out of the shop for three years. She did not come back and, thankfully, I had staff in place that I had trained, as I had trained her. Legislative provisions such as this do not serve small business. It may be suited to the Civil Service but not a small family shop. It does not make any sense.

On SMEs, the agriculture sector is represented by a Minister and two Ministers of State. There is nobody representing retail in Ireland, which is a crying shame.