James O'Connor (Cork East, Fianna Fail)

That is interesting and I appreciate it. We might have a second round to allow me to expand on it.

Another thing I noticed is that some of the money allocated is coming from a €15 million saving in Enterprise Ireland. To me, that presents a worry. One of the topics the committee is hoping to cover in quarter 1 of next year is how we can support young Irish entrepreneurs in their work. Specifically, when it comes to the modern, fast-paced economy, developments with artificial intelligence, where Ireland's place is in that and the disruption it could cause, we are uniquely positioned in a European context. Everybody in the room knows that already in relation to multinationals that have come here.

We should harvest the domestic talent we have created through our higher education. The economic capacity that has been created by having companies here already shows how Ireland could potentially have its own unicorn strategy, similar to what the French have done very successfully with Station F. I know it is not a silver bullet just to go in and allocate capital but when I look at incubators and companies like Dogpatch Labs, while I know there were issues with the National Digital Research Centre, NDRC, there are success stories there. There is a feeling among young Irish entrepreneurs that they need to exit Ireland early on, when they come to foundation stages of their companies, because they do not feel they are getting the full support of the State.

I think this represents an enormous opportunity. I presented a document to our parliamentary party on revitalising the International Financial Services Centre and investing capital there to make it into a world-class incubator. It is a 15-minute journey to an international airport that handles over 35 million passengers and with the passenger cap gone, that will grow again, as well as being within a two-and-a-half-hour travel distance of every major city in the State. We are missing a trick in relation to that. I would like to see the Department looking at that, particularly when I see that €15 million is being knocked off from Enterprise Ireland. Is there not a better way of using that money than investing in space programmes, etc? I am not taking anything away from that. I know it is probably needed and maybe I am being a bit unfair but I think it is a good question to ask.