Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael)

Cuirim fáilte roimh deis labhatha ar an ábhar tábhachtach seo. An article in last week's edition of The Economist stated the desire for economic growth is a little bit like the desire for world peace in that it is universally accepted. To get economic growth, we have to do more than pay lip-service. We need to focus and target how we are going to achieve growth to do the heavy lifting and pay off our debt. Over the past 12 months I have visited many schools in my constituency and tried to explain to students why the economy crashed. I have pointed out how before the crash we spent our time buying and selling property from each other instead of looking outward as a trading nation, producing goods and selling them abroad. I have used the analogy of two people behind the counter in a sweetshop buying from and selling to each other but no one coming into the shop to buy sweets.

My emphasis as a public representative is on supporting the real engine of this economy. Members from all sides of the House have answers for everything but few solutions. The answers are the easy bit; the solutions, tougher. Much time is wasted creating pie-in-the-sky wish lists of improved services, supports and payments. We must examine what can drive and support this. These wish lists are worth nothing unless we have an engine to drive and create the finance to fund them.

Recent debates have been dominated by the need for a stimulus in the economy. Stimulus will stand on its own merits in some circumstances. However, there is a significant danger that as Ireland is an exposed island economy with a debt overhang, any stimulus of the billions spoken about could leak back out of the economy. Many economists have recognised this. On this side of the House we have to be responsible before we bring anything to fruition.

This Bill represents a real and productive stimulus as it supports the heart of our economy and the engine that drives it, that being the small to medium sized enterprise, SME, sector. While there are, unfortunately, 23 million people unemployed across Europe, there are also 23 million registered SMEs. If each of these SMEs created one solitary job, it would wipe out the unemployment nightmare that blights society here, in the EU and across the world. While this may seem an ideal, we have to do our bit as an island economy to work towards that and look further at job creation. The idea of job creation for many previous Governments was, unfortunately, through creating a bloated and inflated public sector with increased layers of bureaucracy and management. We have to go back to basics. We are an island economy which needs to trade its products outwards, get growth and pay off our debts.

Of the 1.8 million working in the economy, more than 900,000 work in the SME sector, one in very two persons employed. The SME sector is a significant contributor to public sector employment through the taxes and revenue it raises. No one claims this Bill is a panacea. I cannot share the negativity from the other side of the House because any step, however small or big, is welcome towards supporting the SME sector. I wholeheartedly and unequivocally welcome this legislation.

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