Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On Hong Kong, what is developing there is very concerning. Many in the population see it in the same way as Deputy Matthews - compromising the independence of Hong Kong and the one country, two systems policy that had led to a lot of stability and had a lot of international support.

On human rights and international business, we have a business and human rights committee that is doing very good work. In fact, enhancing the work of that committee has been one of the topics for discussion in the programme for Government talks, Deputy Matthews will be glad to hear. On the question of ISIF and the role it plays in investing strategically to help to rebuild our economy in a post-Covid-19 environment, we are already using ISIF to make funding available for strategic investment in businesses. The Ministers for Enterprise, Trade and Employment and for Finance announced details in that regard a couple of weeks ago.

In terms of the challenges for business from Brexit and Covid-19 combined, having a budget in place from last year that anticipated the worst possible outcome from Brexit, that is, a no-deal Brexit, was undoubtedly helpful in the context of what followed, which nobody could have predicted. The prospect of a no-deal Brexit and the economic fallout from that in some ways helped to prepare the Government in terms of the availability of resources for the extraordinary disruption to the Irish economy caused by Covid-19. That begs the question as to whether we would be ready to deal with a no-trade deal Brexit on top of the post-Covid-19 pressures in the Irish economy. That would be hugely challenging.

However, we have indicated that we think the appropriate form of economic management in the coming months and years is not to cut expenditure dramatically to close deficits but to borrow prudently to ensure we are investing in creating the stimulus necessary to re-ignite the Irish economy in a post-Covid environment and to ensure we have protections in place for vulnerable sectors should a worse-case scenario transpire, a no-trade deal Brexit and, therefore, the default position of trading to World Trade Organization rules for 2021 and beyond and the consequences that would flow from that. That said, we also need to be realistic about what is credible in terms of borrowing and deficits. I certainly believe that over time we need to show that through economic growth we can close deficits and ensure we bring our financial management back to equilibrium again and, ultimately, into surplus.

An enormous amount of work is going on with regard to how best to support SMEs from a policy and taxation perspective. An SME in Ireland that has been closed because of Covid-19 will have its rates waived for at least three months, the taxes it owes can be warehoused for the moment within Revenue, the rates it paid last year can be claimed back as a grant to re-open and there are multiple low-cost loan opportunities for it. If it is a larger company, it can seek that the State would take an equity stake in the company if that would help keep it alive. The State can pay 75% or up to 85% of the wages of the people employed by the SME. There are multiple supports there, which is hugely expensive for the State but absolutely justified. We will continue to support SMEs through this disruption and out the other side to try to ensure that as many businesses as possible survive and we keep the connection between employers and employees.

Regarding the EU pandemic support funds, we will look to see how we can access that funding in a strategic way. Having said that, I am glad to say that Ireland has the trust and faith of global financial markets. We can borrow money at very low interest rates so we will do that when it makes sense to do that and try to tap into EU support programmes when that is appropriate. This money does not come from nowhere and we will have to contribute to the raising of the funds as well as drawing them down.

See this speech in context