Mary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I would like to thank the Deputies for raising this Topical Issue. I also thank Deputies Fergus O'Dowd and Peter Fitzpatrick, who have raised it with me also. As they will know from my statement in the Dáil yesterday in response to Deputies Martin and Adams, I have been in touch with the CEO of IDA Ireland to discuss the concerns of both the employees and other stakeholders in the Dundalk area.

In September 2014 it was announced that eBay and PayPal would split into two entities by 2015. The official split happened on 17 July 2015 and both companies began trading as separate entities on 20 July. I understand that the two entities wish to operate from separate premises and, to facilitate this, IDA Ireland is working with eBay to find a suitable premises. My concern is to ensure that eBay stays in Ireland and, therefore, I have asked IDA Ireland to work with the company to facilitate it in any way possible in finding a suitable premises in which its operation can continue here. However, the final decision lies with the company alone.

As part of my remit in the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, I am responsible for driving regional development. I wish to ensure that we have a good spread of jobs countrywide and away from the greater Dublin area. Dundalk has done very well in recent years in attracting foreign direct investment, and that is a testament to all the hard work done in making Dundalk an attractive place to do business. In fact, County Louth stands out among the Border counties for its successes in job creation, with 21 IDA Ireland companies supporting 3,245 jobs. This has been a real success story for IDA Ireland. As a further example of this progress, in June 2014 PayPal announced that it would add two new strategic functions, with the employment of an additional 400 people at the Dundalk site to support business growth in North America and global credit functions support in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The addition of these 400 new jobs will bring total employment at PayPal in Dundalk to 1,400 by 2017. Recruitment for these new positions has already started.

Since my appointment as Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, my focus has been on driving forward the regional action plans. The north east north west action plan, which includes County Louth, was launched last November and aims to increase employment in the region by 10% to 15% over the period to 2020, resulting in the delivery of 28,000 additional jobs. Other key targets of the action plan include increasing the number of start-ups by at least 25% through targeted initiatives and programmes to support enterprise, and increasing the number of IDA Ireland investments by between 30% and 40% to 2019. While these are ambitious targets, they are also achievable and well thought out. The agencies under my remit will continue to strive to facilitate the needs of both multinationals and indigenous companies to maintain existing jobs and increase the number of new ones while also ensuring a good spread of employment throughout the regions.

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