Tony McCormack (Offaly, Fianna Fail)

I thank everybody for coming in today and for their opening statements. I look around the room and ask when we as a Government are going to listen. We have had organisations and groups coming in time after time saying insurance costs and the minimum wage are too high. Let us take the minimum wage, for instance. I am a big believer in paying people a fair wage for a fair job, but unfortunately we have gone too far. Ms McCabe talked about the pendulum swinging one way and then the other. It has swung too far. What we are doing as a country is making ourselves so uncompetitive. At the end of the day, the only natural resources we have in this country are our people and our agriculture. We have no oil, gas or anything else we can fall back on.

The FDI companies that come here look at us and, as has been said, say Ireland is one of the dearest countries in Europe in which to do business. We need to address that quickly; otherwise, we are going to fall off a cliff and will have no work. We will not be able to pay insurance for anybody. That has to be addressed and the Government needs to grasp the nettle in that regard.

The minimum wage, as Ms McCabe said, has a knock-on effect on everything above it. The value that was got at €10 per hour is not being got at €14 an hour. The value is lower, and it is getting lower the whole time. This living wage being spoken about is a movable feast because, as the minimum wage goes up, it moves as well. We need to address that quickly.

We have talked about permits and the cost of doing business. A brother-in-law of mine who has a service station has to have 11 permits and licences to be able to do business. There is too much regulation and we need to cut it quickly or we are going to lose out as a country, and then we will not have jobs. Instead of talking about people coming to the country to work and thrive, we will be talking about our people going out to survive, as they are at the moment.

My question for Retail Excellence Ireland is this: what supports does it believe the Government could give to retailers in order for them to survive and maybe thrive in smaller towns, bigger towns and cities?