Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

To respond to Deputy Doherty's points, we aim to release data similar to those released every month in respect of the employment wage subsidy scheme in respect of the operation of TBESS. We will try to provide information to the Oireachtas and the public about how this scheme is operating, what it is costing and any information we are able to extract from the data that is of help in understanding how the scheme is operating. We will do that because as with the employment wage subsidy scheme, when we are using hundreds of millions of euro of the country's money, it is important that we are as transparent as possible regarding its use. I also want to use the data to answer questions about the design and operation of the scheme.

Deputy Doherty said he received some contact regarding the adequacy of the scheme, the level of the cap and whether we have that right. I am very conscious that any decisions about the level of the cap have an exponential effect on the overall cost of the scheme. In order to form a view about whether the design of the scheme is right, we are going to need lots of information about it. I expect this will be available to us early in the new year by when we will have six weeks of companies registering for the scheme. We can then form a view about what will be the real cost of it and whether any change is needed. The reason I am not accepting the call here for a report on TBESS is because we will endeavour to publish the kind of information we published on Covid support schemes, which bear a relationship to this scheme.

Regarding the cut-off and step effects referred to by the Deputy, I will deal with Deputy Matthews and his supposed business in a moment. I may have good news for Deputy Matthews and his business that may be of use to him and concerns how he might participate in the scheme and the design of it. The step effects about which Deputy Doherty is rightly concerned, and he acknowledged that there will be step effects in any scheme, concern the potential for it to become more difficult to predict winners and losers the more variables and criteria for determining who can be in the scheme you introduce. I will use the Deputy's example of cash reserves. He argued that a company with a large amount of cash reserves should not be able to access the scheme but how do you measure what those cash reserves are for an economy-wide scheme? Do you fix a particular amount of money and say that if a company's cash reserves are above it, it cannot take part in the scheme? What is a high level of cash reserves for one company might be a low level for another. If you begin picking thresholds such as cash reserves - I know the Deputy did not do it but Deputy Boyd Barrett did in respect of profit - that of itself can generate lots of winners and losers, which could have adverse effects. If we use profit as a test for whether a company can be in the scheme, not including a low-profit company in the scheme and giving it additional support may undermine that company's medium-term ability to keep people in employment and to continue to trade successfully. I want companies to have a chance through being on this scheme to get out of this energy crisis in a condition that is somewhat similar to their condition before they went into it.

I hope that when this great test of such high energy prices begins to subside, the harm that will have been done to the balance sheets of small, medium-sized and large employers will have been mitigated by this scheme. In order to give us the best chance of that, I believe in setting targets relating to turnover, cash balances and profit. It is exceptionally difficult to do that when one has an economy-wide scheme. The winners and losers, and the step effects that the Deputy referred to, could also grow.

That leads nicely on to the hypothetical businesses attributed to Deputies Ó Murchú and Matthews. We debated energy bills a lot when designing the scheme. Originally, we looked at the issue of energy bills and a change in energy bills. Exactly as the Deputy said, it would look at the energy bill of one company-----