Professor Tom Cooney:

I had better get that one right for the bosses.

The course has been a tremendous success. We are oversubscribed every year. We are currently recruiting for the next course, which starts in September. It is a 12-week online course. The fact that it is online makes it accessible around the country.

In terms of what the LEOs can do, in fairness they are supporting through the mentoring. As I say, we trained up their mentors. However, it comes back to the promotion and the awareness. If we were promoting it through the LEOs, through the localities and making it accessible to everybody in all counties where they would be pushing it and saying that they promote and support this, that would change the game completely in making people aware that this is a career option. That is the part that we are struggling with.

I would argue that disability organisations are somewhat to blame in this as well in that generally when we look at career options for people with disability, it is about how we get them a job and how we support them into employment. Why does the discussion around self-employment not take place? Why can that not be a career option? I am not suggesting it is the panacea that will change things.

We have a number of problems. The first is that not everybody with a disability who is self-employed wants to be a role model. Some people just say they are an entrepreneur and do not want to be a champion or an advocate. Equally, I do not see in the LEO literature or any of its promotional material examples of people with disability. They are not visible. A great example in this country around what works is that almost 15 years ago, when we were having this conversation about women entrepreneurs and the gender gap in entrepreneurship, we created within Enterprise Ireland the women's entrepreneurship unit in 2011.

We created tailored programmes for women entrepreneurs that have become oversubscribed year on year. In 2020, a women's entrepreneurship strategy was launched by Enterprise Ireland and supported by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. It has been overwhelmingly successful. It has reduced the general gap in terms of entrepreneurial activity because we highlighted it. We spotlighted it. Some 13.5% of the population, or 14% in the new census, has a disability. Highlighting and championing these supports as an option and doing it through the local enterprise offices, LEOs, is our best option because the general nature of the types of business coming through would suit them. We can make a difference. We can make change. That is one area and obviously there is the disability supports which we have talked about earlier. I will let colleagues come in.