Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 24 October 2017

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation

Cost of Doing Business in Ireland: Discussion (Resumed)

11:00 am

Mr. Ian Talbot:

We would say the impact of the housing crisis is the big thing that we see coming through. That is coming through primarily in labour costs, but also in people's commute time. We are back to where we were ten or 12 years ago where in order to get accommodation that is affordable, people are having to live further away from their job. The crisis in the infrastructure, public transport availability and reliability and so on all become issues to people's quality of life. It has an impact. If people are arriving at work and they are tired and weary from their journey and are stressed out because of their finances, they are not going to be as productive when they get to their job.