David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State and her officials. I, too, associate myself with the condolences to the Minister, Deputy Peter Burke, on the recent passing of his mum, which is not easy.

Looking through what we have been presented with, I am struck by the huge amount of work by officials going on in the Department. A huge amount of positive stuff is going on and businesses are being supported. Some businesses were disappointed, in the hospitality sector in particular. We had a discussion on these businesses being under pressure previously. The Minister of State might be able to tell us and point out how they are being supported through the Estimates.

I am very taken with the shared island enterprise scheme. I note it is National Women's Enterprise Day, as the Minister of State said. In my previous role as Minister of State with responsibility for equality, I did a lot of work in that space, including with the Balance for Better Business strategy, which I understand the Department is supporting in a big way and is going very well. I am also interested in the green cross-Border investment project, which includes huge initiatives. The Minister of State might tell us a little about that.

An additional €7.9 million for the various guarantee schemes is being looked for. A lot of money has been paid out in that regard, but does that indicate a defaulting on the loans that were given? How many are there? Will the Minister of State say a bit about that?

I will talk about the humanitarian relief programme. I come from Midleton, which was probably most impacted in a dreadful way by Storm Babet, almost a year ago now. Tomorrow is the anniversary. I put on the record my thanks to the Department and officials who supported businesses and community groups in the town where I live to a huge extent. I am not sure whether people realise how devastating it is to have everything you own and all of your business wiped out completely. Red Cross officials came and dealt with people in a very positive, supportive and humanitarian way. This scheme meant so much to people. I was asked a question today; I think I know the answer but I will put it out there anyway. A constituent called me this afternoon who wanted to know whether the grant money was taxable. My answer to her was "No", as it is grant funding, but I want to be clear on that. I ask for an answer from the Minister of State on that.

I will make two suggestions. It is to be hoped we will not see the need for this again but, with climate change and so on, it will probably happen. Some businesses were insured but not to the amount they needed in the event of what happened with Storm Babet. They were insured to cover normal flooding events but that event was extraordinary. As they were not refused insurance, they did not qualify under the Red Cross scheme. They did the right thing. They applied for and got insurance. They were insured to a certain limit but when they applied for the humanitarian relief, they were denied it, even though they had incurred huge losses in some instances. I accept that was the way the scheme was designed. Those businesses know that. It could be said that if they had paid a higher premium and got more insurance, they would be fully covered. In the normal course of events they were covered, but this was an extraordinary event. That might be taken into account in future. In the event that someone was not refused insurance but had taken on what might be called a reasonable amount and quality of insurance, their losses might also be taken into account. The person next door, who was unable to get insurance, got compensated by up to €100,000, which was extraordinarily generous and supportive and was administered in a very positive way. That was one little glitch in the system that could be looked at in future.

The other issue is that it was decided that premises had to be rateable in order to qualify. I came across one or two cases where people had, unfortunately, temporarily moved merchandise to a premises that was not rateable. That premises was flooded and they lost everything. They could not be covered by the scheme either. Those are two glitches that we could not resolve because the scheme was designed in that way. Those kind of anomalies that crop up might be taken into account in future, where people are caught through no fault of their own. Otherwise, the scheme was very well administered and designed. The money was paid out very quickly, which saved businesses from going under. The Red Cross personnel operated in a very friendly, humanitarian and professional way. I want to put that on the record. The town where I live was absolutely devastated with water 3 ft or 4 ft high or more inside premises. It all happened within 20 minutes. It was so fast it was just unbelievable. It was so bad it was biblical.

Will the Minister of State tell us how the power up scheme will work? I like the idea of the SME test. Are there examples of where technology gateways and technology centres are at, including the location and what they are? The digital services commissioner was mentioned.

Employment permits are the final thing I will talk about. I note there is an expectation of an increase in funding there. What is happening to the commitment given to link an employment permit with a visa so there is a single application procedure? That whole system is still very cumbersome, even though the Department has made a lot of advancement on that. Will the Minister of State tell me how the intra-company transfer partner or spouse work permit system, which is an old issue I was on about for a long time that finally got over the line this year, is working? That is something we wanted to get done. The Minister, Deputy McEntee, made a decision that spouses and partners of people on intra-company transfers could work straight away and automatically. However, there seem to be issues with visas. What kind of permit do they have to get and where do they get it? I do not see it explicitly mentioned on the Department's website. Maybe I missed it. I looked for it because I wanted to see a clear explanation of that permit. I do not see it, but it might be there and I missed it.