Mr. Leo Clancy:

I do not want to comment on the current job losses. I will say, as other commentators will say, that our thoughts are with those who may lose their jobs and that is the case in any job loss situation.

From an economic point of view we are starting in Ireland from a very positive place. We have had many years of good growth. We have a very diversified economy between multinational companies and Irish-owned enterprises, which we represent. That is a very positive place. Within the multinational base we have had a lot of strength and return from the investments that have been made over many years. I believe that we have a resilient base there but that is more of a matter for IDA Ireland to comment on.

We also have a diversified base in the Irish enterprise sector. We also have a diversified base within the technology sector, which is where we have 4,000 companies of varying skills and necessarily much smaller than the large multinationals mentioned by the Deputy but it is still a very vibrant ecosystem. We do see a lot of confidence among that group. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, 91% of the companies that we spoke to, which is a cohort of 600 and includes a lot of our tech firms, at the start of October flagged very strong optimism around their prospects for growth in 2023. That survey was conducted at a time when people were conscious of some of the effects of the current issues around inflation, energy and other matters. That finding gives us a lot of confidence that the base is optimistic at least but that is not say that this area would be without issues. As the Deputy will have gathered from my opening presentation, I mentioned that we are heading into very uncharted waters and it is impossible to make definitive statements but I do think that we have a lot of strength both in terms of the companies and the diversity within that base. Consumer sentiment is one of the things that affects a lot of the current issues. We have a tech base, in particular sticking with that sector, that is diversified between consumer technology and enterprise business-to-business technology. In the case of Irish enterprises, they are more weighted towards the latter. It is a sector that will continue to be in demand as companies transform themselves with digital across all sectors in the coming years so I am optimistic.

Another thing that is different, in terms of a characteristic of the SME base, is that SMEs, on recognising a changed investment environment in March, April and May of this year, took a lot of steps to extend their capital and took measures to be ready for a period of more uncertainty around raising further capital. A lot of account has been taken of how a downtown might impact on the SME base, and over the last six months in particular.