Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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8. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [9602/23]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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9. To ask the Taoiseach the progress to date in addressing and-or implementing actions proposed by the National Competitiveness and Productivity Council, in the context of Ireland’s Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [10233/23]

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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10. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government’s response to Ireland’s Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [11007/23]

Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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11. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [11252/23]

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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12. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [11541/23]

Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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13. To ask the Taoiseach if he will provide an update on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [11546/23]

Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The next grouping is Questions Nos. 8-13. If we work together we can get through all the Taoiseach's Questions. I ask Members to be brief and keep to the questions.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Presumably that includes the Taoiseach.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I am happy to comply. I will stop when the clock stops.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 8 to 13, inclusive, together.

The National Competitiveness and Productivity Council published its annual competitiveness challenge report in September 2022. The report makes recommendations to the Government across a range of policy areas. On 29 November 2022, the Government published a formal response to the council's recommendations. This is the third year in which a formal response was issued by the Government to the challenge report. The response was co-ordinated by my Department which drew together material from other relevant Departments. The council outlined a set of 20 priority actions or recommendations across a broad set of areas for Government consideration. These include boosting productivity, enhancing the labour market, supporting infrastructure investment and managing business costs. The Government welcomed the focus of the council on the priority areas outlined and agreed on their relevance to Ireland's continued competitiveness.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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One of the challenges identified by the report Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022 is the need to enhance labour market performance for the purpose of increased productivity and competitiveness. The report finds that increased performance can be achieved by increasing participation and fostering skills and calls for these productivity gains to be shared with workers which is an important emphasis that should be noted by the Government and by employers. Digital literacy and skills are identified as core competencies to be embedded throughout the workforce. It is timely as the global theme of this year's International Women's Day is the unprecedented potential that now exists to eliminate disparity and inequality in the lives of women through technology, in particular women and girls from disadvantaged communities. There remain significant access gaps which require better digital infrastructure, coupled with provisions around affordability, accessibility, online privacy and safety to ensure meaningfully that more women are connected. More generally, we know that computer use is split according to socioeconomic status, with half of those in lower socioeconomic groups - that means poorer people - using computers daily compared to those on higher incomes. The report notes that without quality education, upskilling and reskilling opportunities throughout the life cycle, the economy is at risk of being constrained. The Government's ongoing refusal to regularise the contracts of education and training board, ETB, adult tutors is even harder to comprehend when set against this advice from the council. When will the Taoiseach recommit his Government to addressing the economic and gender blockages to digital access?

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Taoiseach for his comprehensive reply. To what extent has the Government put the various issues raised by the council on a priority list with a view to a response within a specified time and to what extent will benefits accrue to the economy as a result of the implementation of each of the points?

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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One of the issues identified as a barrier to our competitiveness is the lack of housing people can afford. With regard to the Government's decision to lift the ban on evictions, is the Taoiseach aware that in most European countries tenants who pay their rent cannot be evicted? Ireland is now in the unique position of having some of the highest rents in Europe and some of the lowest security for renters. Is the Taoiseach aware that after 13 years of Fine Gael in office, homelessness is at record levels? It has never been so high. Is he aware that the decision made by the Government yesterday will make homelessness numbers higher? It will directly lead to more people sleeping in tents, cars and on our streets. Is he aware of the devastating impact homelessness has, especially on children? Is he aware that growing up in a confined hotel room affects a toddler's ability to learn how to crawl? Will he reverse the cruel and heartless decision to lift the ban on evictions?

Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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On the topic of Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022, how does the Government propose to deal with the lack of housing, especially where workers are concerned? Foreign direct investment is flooding into Ireland. Companies are advertising jobs but are unable to recruit people because of a lack of housing in certain areas. Shannon town in County Clare is one. It is a constraint we never had heretofore, but suddenly the barrier to taking on employees is the lack of housing in the locality. Would the Taoiseach perhaps consider the practice of many years ago whereby larger companies, such as Guinness, Beamish and Crawford and Shannon Development in County Clare, were incentivised by the Government to build housing schemes for their employees? Would he consider that as another way of building housing stock and allowing these companies to come to Ireland and to have their employees living close to the factory or production line facility?

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Normally when we discuss competitive challenges we see them as issues that affect the bottom line in business, such as energy costs, wage costs etc. However, even now employer organisations are saying that housing is dominating their competitive challenge with workers' inability to find homes. That applies to both the public and private sectors. Schools, hospitals, mental health facilities, public transport etc, as well as the private sector, all report that they simply cannot get people to take up and keep jobs because of the failure of workers to find a place to live. For all the eulogising of Ireland's leprachauns' economy, of the foreign direct investment, the amazing exports, the cuckoo funds that are here etc, the basic fundamentals of providing homes for workers remains beyond our capability. The decision to lift the eviction ban makes absolute sense if the Government's concern is to attract and keep vulture and cuckoo funds and cosy up to corporate landlords. If it sees economic competitiveness as a goal in itself in macroeconomic terms, it is ignoring the human impact on families, workers and individuals, especially children, such as those we saw on "Prime Time", traipsing around to find homeless accommodation.

For once will the Taoiseach be what he always claims to be, which is non-ideological, do the decent thing and tell families facing this terror that he will reverse the decision? We do not mind if he justifies it by saying it is in the interests of the competitiveness of the country. That is fine. It would be in the interests of the competitiveness of the country. We will be standing in solidarity with any of those families who decide to overstay.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I will speak on the same theme. Even business interests are now saying the housing and homelessness crisis is a major barrier to economic development or competitiveness if we want to put it in those terms. The Taoiseach justified what I believe to be the cruel and shameful decision to allow more families, individuals and children to be evicted into homelessness in the coming months on the basis he would do other things, namely, ramp up the purchase of homes where people are threatened with eviction.

Yesterday I received an interesting email from a landlord who has to sell his property for financial reasons but does not want to evict his tenants. This is in my area and it will interest the Cathaoirleach. The landlord approached Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council to say he does not want to evict the tenant and to ask the local authority if it would buy the property. The local authority asked whether he had issued the tenant with a notice to quit. He said he does not want to evict the tenant and that he wants the local authority to buy the property. He was told that if he was not threatening to evict the tenant, the local authority would not buy the house. This is typical of what is going on at present. It is "computer says nah" with Government schemes. It is similar to the issue I raised yesterday with the Taoiseach of the family who were over the income threshold and therefore were not eligible for the tenant in situscheme. The Taoiseach mentioned particular circumstances. There are particular circumstances but let me make it clear: this family will be homeless.

The Taoiseach should maintain the eviction ban, but if he will not do so, will he please tell local authorities to have a human, flexible, explore-all-options approach to preventing people being made homeless and not tell people they do not tick the box of a particular inadequate Government scheme and therefore they cannot do anything for them? This has to change urgently. This example demonstrates the point.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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In response to the Chair's call earlier and Deputy McDonald's comment, I will finish on time. I thank Deputies for their questions on Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022 report, which is the matter for discussion. As Deputies know, I meet all the time people who are investors, business people or employers. Of course housing and infrastructure are issues they raise. They also say these are the same problems they often experience where they are headquartered, whether it is in London, San Francisco, New York, Lisbon or other parts of the world that are also experiencing a housing shortage.

Housing can be a constraint on economic growth. Certainly the housing situation is making it harder to recruit and retain staff. We should put this into a factual context. There are now 2.57 million people at work in Ireland, more than ever before. Unemployment is approximately 4%. It is close to an all-time low. Youth unemployment is at an all-time low. Last year was a record year for investment and foreign direct investment job announcements in Ireland. Every year tens of thousands of people come to Ireland to take up employment, which is many more than leave. Certainly from an employment and economic growth point of view, we are doing pretty well, notwithstanding the housing crisis, which is perhaps holding us back from doing even better.

In response to Deputy Crowe's question, I know some employers provide accommodation for their staff. This is not something new. It has been very common in the hospitality sector and the agrifood sector for a long time. I do not think it is the solution to the housing crisis, but if they are willing to do so, it is certainly not unwelcome.

I was asked about the recommendations of the report and how we will implement them. The report identifies a range of recommendations that focus on immediate competitiveness issues and more medium-term challenges, aimed at enhancing our competitiveness and productivity. There are 20 tangible actionable policy recommendations under five main headings. One of these headings covers immediate issues facing the Irish economy, with the focus on our response to inflation and making sure we do not exacerbate or embed inflationary pressures. It also deals with the importance of targeting assistance and productive spending. Another heading covers the need to boost broad-based productivity growth, with a focus on ensuring the approach is as broad as possible. Productivity is the engine of economic growth in the longer term and, as such, it is crucial to improvements in living standards associated with growing and sustainable wage levels, good public services and improved well-being.

It was interesting to see the report from the Central Bank the other day that suggested we will see income grow by approximately 6% or more this year. It is not quite the rate of inflation. In fact, it will probably be higher than the rate of inflation for the year. It has not happened yet but the Central Bank is certainly predicting that we will see a return to what we saw for a long time, last year being an exception, which is incomes growing faster than inflation. It will not be true for all people but it will be true for most people. It will be good if it happens but it has not happened yet.

Another heading in the competitiveness challenge report covers enhancing labour market performance. This is achieved by fostering skills and participation while ensuring the gains from productivity growth are broadly shared with workers and that non-wage labour costs are kept down. It also covers assisting infrastructure investment for a better future, including housing and managing the costs of doing business. As I said earlier, the Department co-ordinates the response. In the vast majority of cases, substantive actions are under way to deal with the points raised by the council. Work is being undertaken by individual Departments as part of their ongoing work.

Deputy Durkan asked specifically about how we are boosting productivity in line with the recommendations. The council made several recommendations on how the Government could boost productivity, including the full implementation of the Harnessing Digital strategy and the implementation of Impact 2030, as well as focusing on the importance of ensuring the twin transitions of digital and green are adequately and appropriately reinforced.

The Harnessing Digital strategy was launched in February 2022 and sets out a pathway to drive and enable the digital transition across the economy and society. There are annual reports on progress published by the Department. Impact 2030, which is our research and innovation strategy, was launched in May. The Impact 2030 steering group and implementation forum, both chaired by the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, are in place and will oversee the strategy. The implementation forum will report annually. The first such progress report for 2022 will be produced in this quarter. The Government agrees with the council on the importance of the digital and green transitions. These are being assisted through the green transition fund, the Harnessing Digital strategy and the digital transition fund.