Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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1. To ask the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on economy and investment will next meet. [55138/23]

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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2. To ask the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on economy and investment will next meet. [56545/23]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take question Nos. 1 to 3, inclusive, together.

The Cabinet committee on the economy and investment was re-established in January 2023. It met twice last year, most recently on 16 November. The next meeting of the committee is scheduled for 15 February 2024.

Membership of the committee comprises: the Taoiseach; the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and for Defence; the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, who is also Minister for Transport; and the Ministers for Finance, Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, Enterprise, Trade and Employment and Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media. Other Ministers or Ministers of State are invited to participate as required.

The committee oversees the implementation of the programme for Government commitments aimed at sustainable economic recovery, investment and job creation, including Harnessing Digital, our national digital strategy. We continue to see good domestic economic performance, more people are at work than ever before, and female participation is at an all-time high. Our economic model continues to be founded on a well-established and successful pro-enterprise policy framework, providing a stable and sustainable regulatory and tax environment, with sound management of the public finances and significant investment in the infrastructure and skills required to ensure our competitiveness. As with all policy areas, economic issues are regularly discussed at full meetings of the Government, where all formal decisions are made.

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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There are six contributors who have 1.5 minutes speaking time each. I call Deputy Dillon.

Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I want first to commend the success of the Government and of Fine Gael's policy in the unprecedented job opportunities which mean that unemployment is currently at an all-time low. Figures have also shown over 1,800 IDA Ireland-backed companies directly employ over 300,000 people in Ireland for the second consecutive year. This also demonstrates a continued strong regional performance for the past year with 132 investments outside Dublin representing 54% of the total investment.

While this good work must be acknowledged, I must raise a matter of concern which is the lack of progress on a new Mayo IDA Ireland facility in Castlebar. Plans were announced in 2021 for the delivery of 19 advance building solutions as part of the key strategic objective under the IDA Ireland's Driving Recovery and Sustainable Growth strategy up to 2024. Of these, eight had been completed by the end of 2023 and another eight were at construction stage. Unfortunately, Castlebar lags in the bottom three of the 19 selected sites across the country. The building in Castlebar, along with the planned buildings in Galway and Longford, remains in the site selection process. A planning application has not been submitted. I urge the Taoiseach to give this project his full attention. The people in Mayo have witnessed success at a previous IDA Ireland facility, namely, Meissner Filtration Products. I ask that the process of site selection be expedited.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The cost of doing business in Ireland makes these worrying times for workers and for businesses, which, as the Taoiseach knows, have been vocal on this issue. Corporate insolvency has reached its highest level in five years, with a 25% rise in 2023. Across the country, towns and villages see long-standing businesses, particularly restaurants and pubs, are closing their doors. Jobs are being lost and communities hollowed out. SMEs are particularly vulnerable and, no doubt, are watching the rapidly approaching deadline of 1 May to start repaying their warehoused tax liabilities. To date, Government supports have been poorly thought out and ineffective.

The temporary business energy support scheme of 2023 was a failure, with only 11.5% of its €1.3 billion budget allocated to struggling businesses. We cannot allow this to happen also with the increased cost of business scheme that will open this year. Many businesses are telling us the Government's proposed structure will not help the 95% of businesses it claims. Companies paying more than €30,000 in rates will not qualify. In cities like Dublin those are not big businesses. They can often be pubs, restaurants and shops paying significant rates, and a recently announced change means businesses that pay between €10,000 and €20,000 will have their payments capped at €5,000. Will the Government revisit this scheme and listen to the voice of business?

Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity)
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I wish to raise an issue about women's rights in the workplace. A woman worker at VMware in Ballincollig working off her contract would get six months' full pay during maternity leave, but the new contract put in front of her on Monday by the new owners would cut that to 12 weeks' full pay during maternity leave. There is a company restructuring taking place and there are mass redundancies in the pipeline. This is being used by the new owners as a battering ram to lower conditions. The rights of women need to be protected and advanced. They do not need to be targeted for attack. They are being targeted for attack here and this is an issue of concern not just to VMware workers but to all women workers, that this is how industry trends can start off. I would like the Taoiseach to comment on the issues at hand there.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I also repeat the issue about the film workers. Over the new year the WRC issued an absolutely damning ruling on the treatment of 38 members of the Irish Film Workers’ Association and established they had been blacklisted by Metropolitan Films International, which is probably the biggest recipient of section 481, and that their rights under the fixed-term workers legislation had been abused. The point is the Irish Film Workers’ Association and some of us in this House have been saying what was done in this case is endemic across the industry. It needs to be addressed because the condition of the €100 million given in section 481 to these film production companies is that they comply with the law by treating workers properly and giving them quality employment and training. It is similar with the actors, performers and writers who are being forced by film producers to sign buyout contracts where they are forced, essentially, to hand over their rights to future royalties and residuals from their performances, which is in breach of the copyright directive. These issues must now be addressed. We need to look at the constitution of the stakeholders' forum, which we asked for in the budget scrutiny committee and there should be cross-party representation from the committee at that forum.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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The housing and homelessness crisis is spiralling even further out of control. It is destroying the lives of thousands of families and children across the State. In South Dublin County Council, 1,452 people were registered as homeless in November, including 653 children. All three homeless hubs in Tallaght are now permanently full. We do not just have a social housing list anymore, we have an emergency accommodation waiting list. Every day as a consequence, families are being sent miles away from school and family support networks into Gardiner Street where, on just one street, the Taoiseach's Government has forced more than 1,000 people to live their lives in slum conditions in 21st century tenements. I met a family a couple of weeks ago with six children and the eight people have been living in one room for over seven months. There is one toilet and no cooking facilities. Whole families, hundreds of them, are in conditions like that for up to two years. Children are growing up, learning to crawl, walk and run, in a single, dingy room. The councils' job used to be to clear the tenements by building social housing and moving people into decent homes of their own. Instead, we are now going backwards. We need to go forward again by building council homes on public land.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputies for their questions. I join Deputy Dillon in complimenting the IDA on its success in securing investment and good jobs for Ireland. Again, over half the investment is occurring outside Dublin. I would like to see that figure rise further in the coming years and I have said that to the IDA board. I will follow up about the Castlebar advance building solution with the CEO of the IDA. I understand there has been a difficulty securing an appropriate site. That was the last update, but I will seek another one. I am very keen to see another investment in Castlebar similar to that of Meissner, which was a good boost for the town economically.

Deputy McDonald spoke about corporate insolvencies having gone up, and that is correct. It is important to point out, though, that the number of corporate insolvencies was extremely low for the past couple of years, due in large part to the Government’s unprecedented financial supports for business, which cannot go on forever. We are still seeing that insolvencies are below the long-term average of about 50 per 10,000 per year.

As for what we can do to help businesses with their costs, which we are doing, the new increased cost of business scheme will provide relief to small businesses affected by rising costs. Under the scheme, in excess of €250 million is being set aside to assist businesses and we will ensure it is all paid out. Approximately 150,000 small businesses, which is 95% of all rateable businesses, are expected to benefit, with each eligible business receiving up to €5,000 from the State in early 2024. The funds will provide immediate financial aid to small businesses in the face of current economic challenges.

A new national enterprise hub will be fully operational early this year and it will have a dedicated team of expert advisers specifically trained to help guide business owners through the range of grants, loans and vouchers that are now available and, where necessary, put the business owner in direct contact with the relevant agency. We have also allocated an extra €9 million to the LEOs to assist small businesses. That boost in funding will allow them to provide essential assistance and resources to local business.

We have also increased the research and development tax credit from 25% to 30% as well as increasing the upfront payment from €25,000 to €50,000, which will especially benefit small businesses. We have increased the VAT registration threshold for microbusinesses to €40,000 for services and €80,000 for goods. That reflects the Government’s commitment to bolstering small business and acknowledging its role local communities.

The debt warehousing scheme is set to expire on 1 May. There has been a significant reduction in warehoused tax debt being paid from a peak of €3.2 billion to €1.76 billion, and the number of businesses that owe tax has fallen from 110,000 to just 57,000. However, we recognise cash flow is very tight for some businesses, especially at this time of year, and we want them to continue to trade so they can pay those back taxes. The Minister, Deputy McGrath, is actively engaged with the Revenue Commissioners on the scheme. Building on undertakings already in place, a proposal is being developed and it should be finalised in the next two weeks. There are several benefits already in place for businesses engaging early on the repayment of warehoused debt.

On the audiovisual stakeholders' forum, I had not heard that it had been established, but if that is the case, I am glad to hear that is happening. It is something I have encouraged the Minister, Deputy Martin, to do. I recognise the very high number of Irish people, businesses, producers and artists who have been nominated for Oscars, particularly Element Pictures. Theirs is an extraordinary achievement and I congratulate them on the work they do and on their creativity. Back in 2017, we announced we would double Government funding for the arts and culture by 2024. We have honoured that commitment and I hope the additional Government support has, in some way, contributed to the success of Irish literature, art and film in the past couple of years.

In response to Deputy Barry's question, I am reluctant to comment on any individual contract or any individual enterprise. We in this House set down the minimum conditions when it comes to all forms of leave and businesses have to apply them. It is up to businesses to decide to offer better terms and conditions if they so choose or if they are negotiating with a trade union, but what we stand over are the minimum terms and conditions we set in these Houses.

On housing, we will be publishing our progress report on Housing For All on Thursday, including the house building statistics from the CSO. I do not know what they are yet but it is my expectation that, last year, we will have built more than 30,000 new homes in Ireland, the highest in 15 years, which is no small example of progress. Homelessness and people living in State accommodation is a much more complex issue driven by lots of different factors that are not necessarily under our control. Where it happens, we try to make sure homelessness is rare, short lived and not repeated. A very large number of the people who have to experience homelessness, almost half, do so for less than six months and the majority, thankfully, for less than a year, but I totally appreciate that is a very long time in the life of a child, in particular.