Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

The role of Government is not to create jobs directly but to create the appropriate business environment by making the right policy decisions to help enterprise to grow, to create new jobs and to maintain existing jobs. In the wake of many years of unsustainable policies that produced anoversized construction sector, a property bubble, a collapse in the public finances, and years of declining share in export markets, the challenge we face now is to totally transform our economy. This will be a difficult transition, particularly in the face of declining international growth. There is a great deal of restructuring and reform required to enhance the capability of enterprises to create employment.

However, since I came into office, I have been working with my Government colleagues to achieve this objective. We launched a jobs initiative last May, within two months of the Government coming into office, to stimulate domestic demand and restore confidence in the economy internationally.

Key areas which I have been working on since then to support job creation by enterprise include improving access to finance for businesses, reforming the statutory wage setting mechanisms, reducing other costs and administrative burdens for enterprise, improving our export performance and supporting innovation. I have also been co-ordinating the preparation of the first annual action plan for jobs on behalf of the Government, which will outline the measures to be taken across a range of Departments to support job creation in 2012.

Significant progress is being made in spite of the continued difficult economic conditions which pertain globally. Last year, in spite of a continued suppressed global market, IDA Ireland supported the creation of more than 13,000 new jobs in client companies, an increase of 20% on the previous year's figures. The agency won a record 148 new investments in 2011, an increase of 17% on the previous year. The IDA has also made a further four announcements to date in 2012, which will create an additional 332 jobs in client companies and support a further 250 indirect construction jobs.

Enterprise Ireland reported that employment in client companies stabilised in 2011, with 141,228 full-time employees, similar to 2010. The agency has also been able to announce the creation of 337 new jobs in client companies since the start of the year.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House.

Enterprise Ireland also estimates that client companies' export sales last year will exceed the pre-recession record levels of 2008. The CSO's latest trade figures show that, up to November 2011, Irish exports overall increased by 4% compared with the same period in 2010, to in excess of €69 billion.

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