Mr. David Broderick:

I will take the question about debt. It is a very difficult nut to crack, as can been seen from our survey. There is something wrong because debt, and the correct level of debt, is very important for growing and scaling businesses. There is also a bit of a hangover from the crash in terms of people not wanting to get into debt, which in one way is fair enough, given what happened over previous years with personal guarantees and where people did get caught out.

The Deputy mentioned the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland, SBCI, and Microfinance Ireland, which are doing fantastic work providing hands-on, tangible support for businesses. One of the solutions would be more of that, please, in terms of how they operate. There is an issue around risk. SBCI might produce a loan and at the end of the day the business effectively has to go through the same risk profile, which is quite difficult. Again, we do not want to go back to where we were but it is difficult for that business to show the same level of risk. Small businesses, by their very nature, are slightly riskier than other secure investments the banks could make.

We want to see more of the long-term investment schemes, such as the growth and sustainability loan scheme. Given the turbulence that has gone on over the past couple of years, there is now a strong case for the introduction of an always-on working capital scheme from the Government to support those small businesses. We have seen enough examples of that over the past couple of years. We would also like a debt solution for scaling operations. That currently falls outside SBCI and Microfinance Ireland and is something we should examine from a Government perspective.