Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

The worrying aspect of the Minister of State's reply is that he relies upon high quality jobs that have been retained, in support of his argument. The theory is that we are losing low quality jobs. The trend that he has just read out for the years 2001-04 does not indicate this at all. It indicates a reversal. Exports started off at €15.7 billion, then reached €16.5 billion, €16.9 billion and €16.5 billion again. Will the Minister of State agree that the worrying underlying aspect is that we are losing manufacturing jobs, some of them to North America in recent weeks? This is a very bad indicator from the viewpoint of the economy's competitiveness. While it may be agreeable worldwide to say that Ireland has a high wage economy, a harsh lesson has been learned historically, namely that when we priced ourselves out of the market nobody had any sympathy for us. Will the Minister of State indicate whether it is likely that steps will be taken by the various Departments to whom these statistics apply to address that particularly worrying aspect of the trend?

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