Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the fund. We welcomed the announcement of the fund at the time as part of Project Ireland 2040. However, we are now one year on. Applications were sought and made and funding was approved, yet no payments have been made to date. Sometimes this diminishes Government announcements. That is not a criticism but an observation at this stage. It diminishes Government announcements that utterances are made but action is slow to follow.

Disruptive technologies, by their nature, are aggressive exciting, changing and dynamic, yet the fund underpinning the assessment of these technologies and the impact they will have on industry and broader society does not have these characteristics. We seem to be slow, lethargic and incapable of making the assessments and payments quickly. I would welcome the Minister's observations on those points.

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