Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We share the same ambition here. I like to think that all parties in this House share the same ambition when it comes to the potential opportunities that might come from Brexit. There is no point in being busy if it is not for a strategic objective. I have met with some infrastructure providers on a number of occasions. It is part of the strategy that we are developing to make sure that every opportunity that might come from Brexit is there and available to us to take advantage of. Companies will make relocation decisions based on a number of factors. We have heard we are coming in the top three of companies' potential relocation options across the board. They will pull a trigger for this jurisdiction, but they will also pull it for other jurisdictions and for other legacy reasons, for example. One big international bank has decided to go to Paris. It made sense because a legacy acquisition 12 years ago meant it already had the authorisation for its banking licencee. If one looks at the action plan for 2017 under the IFS2020 strategy, there are two component parts. The first component part is the Brexit narrative, talking about contingency planning, communications, the Central Bank piece in this and other areas like International Baccalaureate education and what we need to do. The second part is the 40 individual action points and how we are going to address them just in this year alone. There is the matter of IFS and how we plan to grow it for the year. Some points are very Brexit-related and some are less directly so.

No one individual ecosystem in international financial services is going to relocate to another jurisdiction. In insurance, for example, not all insurance companies are going to go to one place and it is good that they do not. It is good that they operate from different jurisdictions, in different markets into the Single Market when they can. The skill-set and having the people here are very important to us. That is why one of the pillars of those 40 action points in the IFS strategy for this year is looking at education, trading and skills development, and also attracting Irish emigrants back home into these high-level jobs that are being created, not just in Dublin but also Cork and other parts of the country.

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