Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy had plenty of time but did not want to do it. In our Department we do analyse what is happening in other countries and we do compare it. Our offering is quite competitive compared with every other country. It is fine if the Deputy finds something in another country that she thinks is good and that we should copy here. The Deputy should mention it, bring it to us and we would look at it. We do that.

We do try to adapt a lot of our schemes. The offering here, including the initial supports announced up until May followed by the July stimulus plan, has been quite good in terms of supporting business. That said, we recognise that those initial offers of the wage subsidies, the restart grants and the rates rebates were scattered across all sectors and going forward with the budget and into the economic recovery plan will require a sector-by-sector, tailored approach. We can now analyse and see what sectors need more support, like the travel agents referred to earlier, or the buses. Different sectors will need different interventions and that is where the conversation needs to go over the months ahead. That is what we are doing in our Department - we are meeting every sector to see how we can tweak or change the schemes to suit them and that will inform the drawdown from the recovery fund in the months ahead.

The approach being taken by the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform is right. We have a recovery fund which we can use at different stages over the 12 months ahead because we are not fully sure what sectors will need adjustment or more supports. We have to monitor that but we also have to be in a position, as the Government and as a country, to adapt and respond. I hope that Members here, as individuals or groups, will come forward in a responsible way with various ideas and suggestions. Let us know because this is about trying to spend the recovery fund wisely in a way that sustains jobs while also recognising that we must look to future jobs, new jobs as well as reskilling. Quite a lot of resources will be put into reskilling, upskilling and apprenticeship schemes, about which we have been talking for many years. It is well recognised that there is great potential there but we must tailor the schemes appropriately.

Deputies must acknowledge that what has been done so far was to get us through the initial six or seven months. The plan published yesterday is not about announcing moneys or supports in general, apart from for the health service. It is about giving people a window onto what will happen under each stage and why we have to go from levels one to five, if needs be. It is about the management of the virus. Separate to that is the supports to enable businesses to open up and the wage subsidy scheme has played a major part in that regard. Quite a lot has been done with taxpayers' money but more will need to be done in certain sectors and the Government recognises that.

Deputy Harkin raised the issue of the pandemic unemployment payment rates and I understand what she was saying. Indeed, the point she made would have come through at a lot of our meetings as well. The Minister with responsibility for social protection, Deputy Humphreys, will respond to that and is well aware of the situation. Again, we are trying to encourage people back to work because in some sectors people are telling us that they cannot get staff. We have to get that balance right and we will try to do so. That said, we must also recognise that some sectors cannot get back to work and the Deputy is absolutely right about that.

Deputy Pringle asked about the restart grant which amounts to quite a lot of money for quite a lot of businesses. I do not have the breakdown but I will get it for the Deputy. It is not the case that the majority of businesses only got €4,000. If one analyses the rates paid by companies over the last couple of years, the average paid was between €7,000 and €8,000 so that is probably where the grant is at. Many businesses will get €25,000 and some will get €20,000. I have met quite a lot of business people in my county that have gotten €15,000, €16,000 or €17,000 which is quite a significant amount. It is not the case that businesses have only received €4,000. The Deputy is only taking an average figure. I am just telling him what the facts are and I am happy to get the details for him. We will get the figures for the Deputy. All of that can be seen because we are able to see the rates payable for the last two years. It is quite visible and nobody is hiding that. The grant is up to €25,000 for companies that would have paid rates last year up to that amount. It is quite significant and business people will say that it is quite a lot. That said, we need to do more and are prepared to do so.

Certain sectors are not able to get fully back to business and we must decide how best to deal with them. Do we put them on life support and try to make sure they are still there in six or seven months when we need them? As was said in the context of travel agents, if we do not do that, we will lose that business to other countries. There are certain areas that need specific support and that is what we will have to do. People will have to contribute to that debate over the next few months and put forward suggestions for certain areas. We must all accept that there is not an endless pot of money but we must spend what we have as wisely as possible.

Issues were raised about the credit guarantee scheme, the banks and so on. Deputy Mattie McGrath claimed earlier that we are bailing out the banks again but the credit guarantee scheme has nothing whatsoever to with the banks. It is about reaching banks' customers with a financial product they can afford. The credit guarantee scheme involves the use of taxpayers' money to guarantee loans, up to 80%, to enterprises and companies. That is a support for business and is not a support for the banks. Trying to muddy the waters with that claim is a little bit silly, to be honest. We have already seen this week that the credit guarantee scheme is having an impact on the cost of money to businesses and that is what it is about. It is about reducing the costs to business. Many financial institutions, including the credit unions and others, have applied to be in that scheme and they will bring forward more products, which is what it is about. Deputies should not judge the scheme on the basis of what happened six or 12 months ago because it is a new scheme. The governing legislation only went through the Houses in July and the scheme has only been operational for the last few weeks. It is in the months ahead that we should judge the scheme and I am quite confident that it will have an impact and will be of support to business. Everyone is coming in here and saying that businesses do not want to borrow but we have to be honest with businesses. If we are to get through this it will require a combination of grants, wage supports, upskilling funding and so on but there will also be a necessity along the way to borrow money. In the last seven or eight years since the recession there has been a reluctance to borrow and I can accept that. I worked with a lot of companies in my time and I know that this will need a combination of liquidity, grants and borrowing. There is no point in kidding people that the State will be able to provide every penny because it will not. The State does have to step in to reduce the cost of borrowing and to make credit easier to access for businesses so that those that have good cashflow and good plans for the years ahead can borrow money. It would be wrong for Deputies to constantly tell businesses that it is all going to be grants because that is just not possible, regardless of who is in government. We have to be honest with people. The aim is not to indebt them or put a noose around their neck that they cannot afford. Rather, the aim is to get that blend right. That is why we have vouchers issued through the LEOs to help businesses assess their situation and make a case. They will be able to use the voucher to get financial advice on trading their way out of this situation. We should not be giving people false hope, however, because that is unfair.

Contact tracing was mentioned by quite a few speakers. It is very important and part of yesterday's announcement was about beefing up the team of people involved in contact tracing and testing. It is important we do that. People were set aside to do that but they had been taken from other Departments and offices. We are now specifically signing people up to take over that work. It is important we do that in order to deal with the next five or six months because that is a support in terms of keeping the economy open as well as protecting public health. The approach is two-pronged.

There is no point in denying that Covid-19 has had a major impact on everybody. It has affected all of our towns, villages and counties. When it comes to business and those who try to create and sustain jobs we must put a wind behind them as best we can and in a timely manner, with additional supports. We are engaging with the retail sector quite a lot. I am chair of the retail forum and we recognise that a lot of the sector, apart from groceries, is under immense pressure. There are around 300,000 retail jobs in this country so we want to get people back into that space. Footfall is returning in certain areas but is moving away in others. In the cities and large urban areas, footfall is down and will take quite some time to recover. It is back to about 60% in some cases but it will take a long time to get back to pre-Covid levels. That said, other areas can benefit from that. We must make sure we manage the opportunities and see how we can equip our towns and villages to take advantage of potentially new customers. We need to get that balance right. We recognised, even before Covid-19, that there was a move to online trading in retail and other sectors. We are trying to row in there with supports to encourage more businesses to adapt their own offering. That is why we have the online retail grant through Enterprise Ireland. That scheme is open again but will close at the end of September. I would ask businesses with ten or more employees to look at the scheme and submit an application. It is quite an attractive scheme. The grant in most cases is over €35,000. Most people will also be familiar with the online trading voucher scheme. We have put a lot of extra money into that through the LEOs, with extra staff who are encouraging businesses to go online to compete for the market share that they may have lost in the last couple of years. Online retail sales have really taken off during Covid and we want to make sure that Irish companies can benefit from that too.

Time has run out but we will talk about some of the other issues again.

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