Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy knows, the committee presents a great opportunity to discuss policy. There is no problem engaging regularly at its meetings on policy initiatives.

The Deputy touched on the action plan for jobs. Forfás was driving the action plan for jobs from the start. Mr. Shanahan, who has now moved to the IDA, was a key driver of the plan when he was in Forfás. Nothing has changed and the commentary will not change. What Forfás was doing in the past was gathering evidence to make policy decisions. The key people are still doing that. It is recognised that the Department - the Deputy was there himself - experienced a reduction in the number of personnel in the area of policy formulation and research. We now have a very strong unit that brings together the staff of Forfás with the staff already in the Department. From what I can see, I am happy with our daily policy decisions. We have proper information with which to make decisions. They are evidence based and not based on the whim of any Minister. The three of us here want to do the right thing.

The Deputy criticised the action plan for jobs. If we had not lost the whole enterprise agenda during the boom years, we would not need an action plan for jobs. The fact of the matter is that we had lost the basis of enterprise-driven economics in this country. The action plan for jobs comprises 300 or 400 actions across all Departments and it makes it very clear that it is the role of every Department to contribute to the jobs agenda. We must now refocus and in some cases go back to basics, but if the previous Government had done its job correctly we would not have to go back to basics.

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