Dr. Sinéad Keogh:

I will respond to the first question about what we can do in terms of incentivising. Perhaps somebody else would like to answer the other questions. We would like to see more SMEs engage in the current apprenticeship. It has been developed for all of the economy. We want to make sure they have the opportunity to engage. If we are looking at a salary of €24,000, the cost for 15 weeks is roughly €7,500.

We are looking for an incentive of €7,500 for SMEs to take on an apprentice. This is not including all the costs of training that apprentice.