Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The difficulty I have with the scheme is that the rationale and rhetoric sounds great but when will it hit the street? When will companies that need the finance get it from the development capital scheme? All of the initiatives the Minister has taken are announced in a blaze of glory but the practicalities on the street are minimal. In the first year of its existence the microenterprise loan fund has lent just €1.62 million. The target the Minister has set is that it will create 7,500 jobs by 2022. We have just dealt with the seed and venture capital fund. The credit guarantee scheme is way under target, as is the SME credit fund. ISME’s survey indicated that up to the end of September 57% of respondents had been turned down. We will later discuss source funding as a potential alternative option. There is still huge difficulty for SMEs to get money to ride the wave of growth that exists. If the Minister wants to continue with the figures we saw yesterday this has to be his No. 1 priority in terms of resolving the issue.

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