Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not accept Deputy Creighton's charge. The Deputy is well aware, because she was a member of the cohort of Ministers in 2011, that on this Government taking up office the country from an economic point of view had about three months' resources left to pay everybody, including teachers, gardaí, nurses, other public servants, pensioners, social protection payments and so on. The economic collapse affected hundreds of thousands of people and thousands of companies. In the ensuring period everybody had to face many challenges, including the loss of 100,000 jobs in the construction sector and many more in other areas. It is true that small companies lost serious numbers of employees. However, under the most recent budget every person received the same tax reduction, whether self employed or a PAYE employee. Persons not paying tax were not entitled to a tax reduction.

Last Friday, I attended a meeting in Ballina at 8 a.m., at which there were 200 people representative of small businesses. They were at that meeting to hear about what is now available for small and medium enterprises, including what assistance they can get, the function of the local enterprise offices and the function of Enterprise Ireland in terms of export assistance and the spin-off of foreign direct investment for services and so on. I do not take the view that these people were beaten down. They have faced and come through many challenges and are now focused on where they go from here. Of assistance in this regard will be the strategic investment bank, the implications of the ECB decision, the ease with which companies can now be formed and can take on employees and the JobsPlus scheme under which an employer receives €10,000 for taking on a person who has been on the live register for over two years. Some of the multinationals are now profiling that register and are retraining and upskilling people who did not think they would have the opportunity to work again and are now very happy to do so and to make their contribution.

Deputy Creighton makes the point that I have the power to make appointments. I do not, except in limited circumstances. The majority of appointments made to the NESC are based on nominations from specific sectors. Nominations are received from business and employer organisations, ICTU, farming and agricultural interests, the environmental sector and the community and voluntary sector in accordance with the legislation. I do not have that power of appointment. I do have the power to appoint public servants from the Departments of Finance, Education and Skills, the Environment, Community and Local Government, Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and my own Department to ensure a complement of staff on the NESC relevant to its work. I also appoint eight independent people to the NESC. These appointments are made following careful consideration of the knowledge, experience and expertise relevant to the function of the council, as is required under the legislation. For example, some of the appointees are academics and include representatives from the associate research professorship in the ESRI; economists from NUIG, including Professor John McHale; Professor Mary Daly, professor of sociology and social policy, University of Oxford; representatives of the department of geography in TCD and so on. All of these people are independent academics who have particular experience and expertise.

When appointment of the next Council arises, the question of SME representation might be more focused. In regard to changing the Act in so far as it provides a requirement that nominations be sought from business and employer organisations, a question arises as to what is a business organisation? Is the Small Firms Association a business organisation? Are the employer organisations business organisations? Of course they are. They speak with knowledge of how business operates and the challenges for business, including all of the difficult challenges they faced over the past number of years, which are now easing in terms of exports.

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