Micheál Martin (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)

Deputy McCormack raised infrastructure reform, particularly for small to medium-sized businesses. Some of the measures we have taken in respect of deferring the alignment of the minimum wage with the national living wage will help to avoid the escalation of costs because the SME sector has borne the brunt of a lot of additional costs over the past five years. There is no doubt the reduction in VAT on hospitality will help a lot of SMEs in the hospitality sector and hairdressing as well. The number of sick days leave is going to be quickly expanded. We have expanded it to three days. The cumulative cost of everything has been fairly excessive. The Small Business Forum is there to try to balance imposition on small business as well as the cost.

The other issue is the sequential approach to planning and regulations as opposed to a concurrent approach whereby instead of waiting for the planning to be done, agencies do the procurement. Instead of waiting for environmental assessments, doing them all in parallel would speed up a lot of activity. In many instances, we are constantly looking at the avoidance of increased cost for SMEs and trying to slow down the increased costs that have come their way. It is interesting the rate of youth employment has crept up in the past six to nine months. I believe that is related to costs on SMEs.

Deputy Dolan is correct that retrofitting is the most effective way to reduce costs. Between 2019 and September 2025, the Government provided over €1.5 billion in support to homeowners for over 228,000 upgrades, including 30,000 fully funded retrofits under the warmer homes scheme. It is estimated that if a deep retrofit is done, it can save a household up to €1,100 per year in energy costs. I get the Deputy's point that the administration of it needs to be faster. There is also resource demand in respect of it as well with some people not being able to afford to do retrofits because of the cost.

On Deputy Ó Murchú's issue, I do not have the specifics on Ardee Educate Together National School. I do not know what the interaction with the county council is, but in any event-----

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