Jack Wall (Kildare South, Labour)

That is not a possibility. They are rivals each day of the week and it could take two to three weeks to put a tender together

I agree with the Minister of State. What I am asking is that he goes the next step to ensure the National Procurement Service enters into dialogue with the SME national organisations to give them the opportunity to take up his challenge. If the NPS continues to state that unless a SME has an income of €10 million over the past three years it is not at the races, then what the Minister of State is saying will not hold up and the SMEs in Ireland will fall by the wayside.

There is no sense in saying that it can happen if we do not underpin it to ensure that it does happen. I am asking the Minister of State, whose side I am on in the challenge we face, not to rule out our own companies because we put a mechanism in place that the previous Government thought was appropriate. That is no reason to say that we think it is appropriate. We must accept the challenge to ensure the position of SMEs. With 2,500 workers, we cannot wipe them off the slate as simple as that.

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