Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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1. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [22488/23]

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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2. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government’s response to Ireland’s Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [25769/23]

Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party)
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3. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [25953/23]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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4. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [26404/23]

Joe Flaherty (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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6. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [28109/23]

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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7. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government’s response to Ireland’s Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [28115/23]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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8. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [28603/23]

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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9. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the Government's response to Ireland's Competitiveness Challenge 2022. [28611/23]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 9, inclusive, together.

The National Competitiveness and Productivity Council, NCPC, published its annual competitiveness challenge report in September 2022. It 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 competitiveness challenge report. This response was co-ordinated by my Department, drawing together material from relevant Departments and agencies.

The council outlined a set of 20 actions or recommendations across a broad set of areas for Government consideration. These areas include boosting productivity, enhancing the labour market, infrastructure investment and managing business costs. The Government welcomed the focus of the council on the areas outlined and agreed on their importance and relevance to Ireland's continued competitiveness. The response outlined the specific actions under way across different Departments in answer to each of the recommendations of the council.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Letterkenny Chamber of Commerce met Oireachtas Members at the end of last month to outline the development and growth challenges for business in Donegal and the north west. I travelled to Letterkenny last week to speak at the chamber's lunch, and the message from its members was absolutely clear, that significant shortfalls in transport infrastructure, the housing crisis and staff shortages are holding back progress in the region. Those challenges are interdependent and are the negative outcomes of historical political and policy neglect.

Despite these failures by the current and former Governments, there are fantastic home-grown innovators in Donegal, creating exciting opportunities in domestic and foreign domestic investment, FDI, enterprises. Imagine what could be achieved if a Government finally gripped the long-acknowledged connectivity deficits of the north west and addressed the fundamental housing and cost-of-living crises. Donegal, as the Taoiseach will know, has always suffered from excessively high levels of emigration. Add to that the shortfalls in the defective block scheme, the housing crisis and the cost-of-living crisis and we have a perfect storm. Young workers continue to emigrate. The skilled staff hired into the county face undue and sometimes impossible challenges to secure accommodation. These are old problems that have been manifested and multiplied into new crises this Government has yet to fully accept. They directly impact people's lives and quality of life and on the competitiveness, social cohesion and well-being of the region. What response has the Taoiseach to the challenges that have been laid out by the Letterkenny Chamber of Commerce? What commitment can he give not only to Donegal but to the north west as a whole to show that he has the willingness, ear, heart, stomach and ability to address all of this?

Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party)
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At recommendation 1.4 of Ireland's competitiveness challenge report, the NCPC recommends that the actions put forward by the Commission on Taxation and Welfare are addressed. In its reply, the Government has undertaken to consider changes in site value tax, or tax in general as it relates to land. Has the Taoiseach considered, or has there been significant consideration of, a site value tax, particularly as it relates to rates? As we know, the rates system at the moment is a significant barrier to business. It vests with the tenant and not with the owner of the property. A site value tax would allow those rates to vest with the owner and would remove significant barriers particularly for small to medium businesses in Ireland. Such a tax would also be likely to increase the take for local authorities.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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In rural areas, in particular, one of the challenges facing businesses and enterprise in general is inadequate infrastructure. In my constituency of Cavan-Monaghan, most businesses are indigenous and home-grown. Some of those enterprises started as one-person businesses and are now international companies with their headquarters remaining in Cavan and Monaghan. In my area, the agrifood sector, engineering and construction products are an extremely important part of the local economy. By and large, those are bulky products and as we do not have a rail service, all goods are transported by road. A total of 93% of the road network in County Cavan is non-national and we need more upgrading of these vital arteries for the betterment of local residents and all businesses and for the protection and growth of employment.

With the public finances in good health, there should be much more investment in the road network now to help businesses to reduce cost. The massive increase in road construction costs over the past two years has considerably reduced the amount of work local authorities are able to carry out this year with the allocations they have received to date from the Department of Transport. Additional investment now will prevent further deterioration in road standards and will save the State funding in the future. I believe that substantial additional funding should be provided to local authorities in the middle of this year towards road maintenance and road construction, particularly of the non-national road network. We are all well aware that poor infrastructure adds additional costs to businesses which they do not need in these challenging times.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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Housing for All, the national retrofitting scheme and the delivery of our national development plan are all placing considerable stress on our competitiveness and our ability to respond to our labour market needs. A report published recently by the expert group on future skills needs stated there are considerable pressures forthcoming on our labour market in terms of building and delivery of our future infrastructural needs. Are we doing enough to provide apprentices and train people in adequate numbers to meet those continuing pressures?

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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It is interesting that the Taoiseach was talking about the difficulty of the leaving certificate mathematics exam when it is clear there are problems understanding mathematics in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. The competitiveness challenge report highlighted the vital need to address the high cost of housing and one of the centrepieces of the Government's response to that issue is cost rental. I draw the Taoiseach's attention to the fact it is not possible for large numbers of people on many of the incomes within the cohort or band of earnings between €40,000 and €53,000, which is the income band that cost rental is supposed to address, to meet the criteria. Their applications are not even being allowed. For example, for people earning €45,000 with a need for two-bed accommodation, the criteria mean they are only allowed to pay a rent of €1,312. However, the rent for two-bed accommodation in Delgany under the cost-rental scheme is €1,445. Even people who are earning €50,000 and have a need for three-bed accommodation are not allowed to apply because the rent is €1,530 but they are only allowed to pay €1,458, which is 35% of their income.

Somebody has seriously messed up on the maths here. The criteria do not align to even allow applications for huge numbers of the people for whom this scheme is supposed to apply. I have come across three cases. This also has implications for the cost rental in situpurchase because if you do not fit the criteria, the local authority says it cannot buy the house. This is serious and urgent, and the Government needs to address it.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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The way that the workers at Tara Mines have been treated is utterly disgraceful. They found out that they are to be temporarily - they do not know for how long - laid off yesterday. Some of them found out through watching the Nine O'Clock News that, effectively, they will be left without pay.

The company says it is due to a variety of factors in terms of zinc prices, inflation, energy costs etc. The company does not mention the fact that when there were previously high prices for zinc, Tara Mines was operating extremely profitably. In 2021, it recorded pre-tax profits, specifically from Tara Mines, of €19.75 million. In 2022, extra dividends were paid out to the shareholders of the overall company as a result of the very big profits that are being made.

If the company wants to shutdown temporarily for a period of time, it should not take the workers off the payroll. It should continue paying the workers. That is a cost that the company should continue to bear.

It is scandalous. These workers are left with no knowledge. The guy who was on the radio this morning, on "Morning Ireland", could not say if this was for weeks, for months, or for a year or longer. That is a horrendous situation to leave workers in. It is completely unacceptable. Will the Government be saying to the company that it needs to put these workers back on the payroll and if it does not do so the Government will consider nationalising the company because these sort of natural resources should be in public ownership? Zinc can be an important part of a just transition. It can be used as an alternative to lithium for electric batteries. The Government should be acting to defend the jobs.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputies for their contributions.

Deputy McDonald spoke about her visit to Letterkenny and her engagement with the chamber of commerce there. I have had the chance to visit the county on many occasions, including in recent months. I visited Tata Consultancy Services, TCS, a multinational company employing over 1,000 people now in Letterkenny, which is great to see. I visited the hospital. I met with families and have been in homes affected by mica. I want to acknowledge some of the real problems that the county faces, whether it is economic development or housing, or the cost of living or mica, but I have to say things are not as bleak as the Deputy made out. I know there are companies thinking of investing in Donegal and investing in the north-west and I hope they are not brought to meet Deputy McDonald because they would probably be put off investing in the region and might choose to invest in another country instead. Far from there being mass emigration, the population of Donegal increased. We know that from the most recent census. It had declined in previous censuses. It is actually now going up again. That is positive. Unemployment is close to, if not at, an all-time low. I am disappointed that the Deputy had nothing good to say about Donegal in her remarks.

In terms of investment in the north-west, to answer the Deputy's question, I will visit the west region tomorrow opening the new road between Castlebar and Westport. I am really looking forward to that. It is the biggest State investment ever in County Mayo. I am very keen to get the A5 up and running, and under construction, which would benefit north Donegal and Letterkenny. The national broadband plan is now a reality. The previous Government, which I led, chose to go ahead with that against official advice. Opposed by Sinn Féin and all the other parties, I do not think anyone now seriously thinks that was the wrong decision because it is allowing remote working to become a real possibility in rural Ireland, allowing new businesses to be established and helping us to get investment into rural counties. There is also the rural fund, which is administered by the Minister, Deputy Humphreys. That Department of Rural and Community Development, established on the day I first became Taoiseach in 2017, is really making a difference now. It took years but it is making a real difference. There is the IDA Ireland regional property programme building advanced factories and advanced building solutions around the country, including one we are working on in Castlebar which Deputy Dillon raises with me all the time. There are the new technological universities, again, making a big difference, established by the previous Government in law and made a reality by this Government. There is also regional aid and cross-Border programmes.

Deputy Hourigan asked about the site valuation tax. When it comes to residential properties, we have decided to stick with the local property tax, LPT, but we are going to give consideration to a site valuation tax with respect to commercial properties because the commercial rates system does not work. It belongs to a different age and there are lots of problems with it which all Deputies will be aware of. Changing to a new system, although a new tax, is never straightforward. There will be winners and losers. People may not like the changes that are being made but certainly as part of that review of commercial rates, a site valuation tax is very much on the agenda and definitely has some merit.

Deputy Brendan Smith raised the issue of additional funding for road maintenance and road restoration. It is something that the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, and I are engaging with the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, on at present. By the way, we do not actually know if there will be an underspend at the Department of Transport. I read some newspaper coverage to the effect that there was. There was in the first quarter of the year but we are now well into the second quarter of the year. It is not clear that there will be an underspend but if evidence of an underspend emerges, I certainly believe that we should reallocate funding to local and regional road maintenance and restoration and perhaps also to the local improvement schemes. That is something that we are working on at present. I appreciate that a decision on that has to be made sooner rather than later because this work has to be done in the summer and autumn.

Deputy Pádraig O'Sullivan raised the issue of apprentices. I am glad to say that we now have approximately 9,000 apprentices signing up every year, which is a big increase, with two thirds in the traditional craft apprenticeships and one third in the new modern apprenticeships. The Minister, Deputy Harris, has set the target of 10,000 and I think we will meet that.

On cost rental income limits, that matter is under review. I will certainly make sure that the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, is aware of what Deputy Boyd Barrett said here today.

Certainly, when it comes to Tara Mines, my understanding is that when the staff are on temporary redundancy they remain on the payroll but they do not get paid by the company. They are able to trigger their redundancy rights at a certain point - not at this point but three-to-six months later. I can absolutely guarantee that the Government will be working with the company to get the mine up and running again as soon as possible and also to secure the future of the mine into future decades through the Tara Deep project.