Mairéad Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein)

Social enterprise policy is incredibly important. It is something that we all see in our constituencies. The crucial aspect here is it includes many people and communities that are often very much excluded. If we are serious about it, I ask the Minister of State to look at how we do procurement and how we use social clauses in the context of procurement. The biggest spender in the State is the State. We need to use the resources of the State in our communities in order that there is a knock-on effect in terms of the local economies and these types of enterprises as well.

If we are serious about areas and communities that are excluded, we also need to look at those areas and communities that do not have the basic infrastructure to allow them to have successful enterprises.

I will take the west of Ireland as an example because it is where I know best. If we look at areas like Connemara, the basic infrastructure is literally at breaking point. The Minister of State will see this if he travels across Connemara, where he will see poles tilted to the side and cables on the ground continuously since Storm Éowyn. Renvyle has been without drinking water for two months and it lost electricity for a day. Basic things like this need to be sorted out if we are serious about being able to have social enterprises or any other type of enterprises across the west of Ireland so economies can thrive.

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