Micheál Martin (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)

I thank all the Deputies who contributed. Deputy Malcolm Byrne was first out of the traps about the 11% of recommendations, which is quite low, implemented from the Draghi report. Ireland is already identifying the Single Market and some of the reforms in the Draghi and Letta reports for our Presidency of the European Union in the latter half of next year. We would like to see an acceleration of the implementation of the recommendations of the Draghi report because they are essential to European Union competitiveness. Draghi pointed out that barriers that exist are much more costly than any tariff imposed by the US, by three times in some cases.

The publication of the digital strategy and of an updated AI strategy is imminent. Aontaím leis an Teachta Shane Moynihan go bhfuil cúrsaí trádála ríthábhachtach ó thaobh cúrsaí geilleagair na tíre. On employee metrics, I fully agree we need to scale up indigenous companies. Looking strategically at the country into the future, there is an inextricable link between multinational investment and our own SMEs or indigenous enterprises. Many of them are part of the supply chain. Many have grown in expertise because of their relationships with multinational companies but there has been in issue with scaling and growing multinationals in such areas as life sciences or technology. The one area in which we have grown multinationals is food- and agriculture-based industries with such examples as Glanbia, Kerry Group and so on. There is certainly an issue in regard to employee share options and so forth.

Enterprise Ireland manages a leadership for growth programme for companies. In the past, they went to Harvard. I met representatives of 35 companies in New York recently. When I was at the UN , we did a bit of work with our companies and 35 are availing of the leadership for growth programme. They are SMEs. I have met many people who have been on that programme over the years and they all say it had a beneficial impact on their mindset, their ambitions as CEOs and how they had been organising their companies up to that point. Mentorship is extremely important and we work with many companies in the US and the larger Irish companies that help us to mentor emerging Irish companies. However, strategically, the future has to be to increase the scaling up of Irish-owned companies for long-term competitiveness.

Deputy Shay Brennan is on a similar mission, with a specific application to Sandyford. I met the owner of Station F recently. He is an innovative medical person. He is one of the first people I have met in Europe who I can say is a real business leader. We generally interact with US behemoths, such as the digital giants Google, Amazon and so on, but here is a French person, a European, who has a clear vision of the enterprise side and the digital side in particular, including incubation and so on. In terms of Sandyford and how to progress, engaging with Enterprise Ireland is critical in the whole area of incubation and supports available from that unit. Linking up with third level institutions is important in that area because it can give added heft and companies can draw on talent, ability and brains on the campus and link them to the business campus. I recommend those two options and if I can be of any help in talking to Enterprise Ireland and going out to see it, I will because the future is in creating hubs like that to enable entrepreneurship to flourish.

We can do more, if I am honest, on budgetary and fiscal policy, but we can only do so much in any one budget. Very often when we do things for entrepreneurship, they get attacked politically as looking after the wealthy or businesses and so on, whereas we are trying to enable an environment where jobs will be created in the future and they are good high-quality jobs.

DeputyÓ Cearúil's suggestion on the national AI office was excellent. I will talk to the Minister in respect of oifig náisiúnta na h-intleachta saorga. The tuiseal ginideach was spot on. That was the old de Valera policy - name it in Irish and people will cop on and learn a bit of Irish along the way.

It is good news. We made rapid progress on the proposals. Many Deputies recommended the creation and establishment of a national AI office. It is only some months ago it was aired at Leaders’ Questions. We have moved to progressing that and putting it on a statutory basis. I think the AI issue is huge. We have a lot of catching up to do in Europe and in Ireland in respect of AI. There is also the relationship with energy use and AI, which is going to be very challenging, which means we will definitively need offshore wind from 2030 onwards to enable us to avail of the AI revolution. Okay, people will question it. Some are saying now it could be like dot.com, but it is here to stay long term. We need to make sure we can get our heads around it and be part of that agenda into the future. The general view worldwide is that Europe is way behind the United States and China in respect of this.

On Deputy McCormack’s point, because of their previous history Offaly and the midlands is well positioned to become an energy hub using Bord na Móna. I pay tribute to Bord na Móna. As a state company it has transformed very effectively from being a fossil fuel-based company with many climate issues to transforming it to almost the opposite agenda very quickly. It is a very good example of a state company aligning itself with state policy very quickly; not resisting it but going with it. I have been down there quite a lot with Bord na Móna which has enlisted third-party companies which are investing in energy projects in the midlands. The transition programme funding we have received from Europe and, indeed, the national transition funding should help to underpin the continuation of the midlands and Offaly as an energy hub into the future.

Deputy Coppinger spoke about not-for-profit. Someone has to pay in the end. You just cannot magic the grid or investment in it. There is an onus on the Deputy to identify the massive state investment that would be required in addition to what we are investing already to get to a not-for-profit electricity or energy system in Ireland. She referenced the 1970s and 1980s. I was a student in the early 1980s. The 1980s was not a good decade economically.

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