Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I contest what KPMG said as I have heard many people in the business sector advocate the supports in place, which have been enhanced in budget 2025, especially in respect of innovation and the start-up space. Funding for companies trying to scale has been significant. We have worked to close the bridge with the UK because there is a big divide with regard to capital gains tax and incentives for investors coming into the marketplace. We have done a lot in the innovation space and that is one of the key parts of the SME package. We have strengthened the ambition for tertiary partnerships for companies to innovate and breath life into the White Paper on enterprise, where we have the decarbonisation supports we are trying to work on, for which we have lowered the conditions. We have put the national enterprise hub together, with 280 supports across 23 Departments and agencies, ready to support businesses at the other end of the phone. Also, in the digital space we are trying to breathe life into our ambition to get to 90% digital intensity by 2030.

All those supports are in place and we have to help our SMEs to access them. That is something I call for again. We need sectoral representatives, the Government and chambers of commerce to work together to support businesses to trade successfully and to lower their cost base. It is not a zero-sum game, as I always say. What is good for the worker does not necessarily have to be bad for the employer. We have to work together to unlock many of these challenges. It will be up to political parties, Independent candidates and everyone else to set out their ambition to grow our SMEs into the future, how we do that and the mechanics behind it in the days and weeks ahead.

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