Results 481-500 of 20,459 for speaker:Frances Fitzgerald

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The Government has shown its commitment to increasing resources. The Senator must remember that, at the time, it was a merger of three agencies. Obviously, we will always listen to Enterprise Ireland. In terms of the global footprint and putting more people on the ground, both in Ireland and globally, there is a high-level plan to achieve that. The Senator's comments must be taken in the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Yes. I will give the Deputy the detail on that. There are five officials in the Department's Brexit unit.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Yes, they are. Five members of staff are working in the Department's dedicated Brexit unit, which is one of the responses in place to deal with Brexit. As Tánaiste, I chair the co-ordination group that meets the agencies as part of the planning of the Brexit response. I have already chaired one of those meetings. An internal cross-divisional group of senior officials, chaired by the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: We expect to spend the full current and capital allocation.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Obviously the regulatory offices and agencies play a key role in ensuring that markets, including the labour market, work efficiently through smart regulation, which encourages innovation, competition and high standards of compliance and protection of consumers but without unnecessary regulatory cost. I will outline briefly some of the key activities of a number of the agencies under the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The Deputy is right that there were some issues, particularly in terms of recruiting specialist posts. That has been in the public arena. I understand people have been recruited to some of those specialist posts and there is no issue in terms of sanction for them or in moving forward in respect of recruitment, either between ODCE and my Department or between ourselves and DPER. The five...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Not that I am aware of. I do not believe there are.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: I am aware that during an interview on RTE radio last Sunday, Martin O'Halloran, the CEO of the Health and Safety Authority, stated that he had submitted a workforce plan to my Department requesting, I think, 48 additional posts for the HSA. That was just received on 20 September as a draft plan. I have not had an opportunity to study it in detail yet. The topic under discussion on Sunday...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Yes. I met some of the families that are working with the HSA and have lost loved ones through farm accidents when I was at the ploughing. They are doing excellent work in trying to increase awareness and I think we would all want to support that. None of the new posts identified in the draft workforce plan relates to the farm safety inspectors, actually. In respect of the farming...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: I was asked one other question that I did not answer. In the WRC there are 50 plus inspectors serving out of 165 staff of the WRC. I think there has also been a recent internal competition and it is expected that between three and five more inspectors will be appointed shortly.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: I think the WRC is doing extremely good work. From the information that I have given the committee one can see the amount of progress it has made in dealing with complaints in a more timely way, conducting inspections out of the 2,000 plus inspections that are conducted in the workplace. As a result, 1,000 employers have been found to be in breach. The Senator mentioned the fishing...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The first point to be made is that the board is self-funding, and that is very positive. The general reaction to its work is that such work has led to a more efficient management of injury claims. The board appears to be very efficient in the way it carries out its work. Maybe the Deputy can supply me with the details and I can come back to him. I do not really have further information....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: Yes. I will get the information on the turnaround time and give it to the Deputy. I know, generally speaking, it was seen as a huge improvement in the management of claims in terms of time.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: I will try to get details and comparisons from the time the organisation was founded until now-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Mid-year Review of the 2017 Estimates for Public Services: Vote 32 (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: -----and I will revert to the Deputy.

Written Answers — Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Local Enterprise Offices Establishment (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: As the Deputy may be aware, the Government Decision of April 2012 provided for the dissolution of the 35 County Enterprise Boards and the establishment of 31 Local Enterprise Offices (LEO) in each Local Authority area. On this basis the LEO Louth was established in the County Council Offices in Dundalk. My Department has no current plans to deviate from this model. The role of the Local...

Written Answers — Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The issue of empowering the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) to issue civil fines has been examined by my Department.  The current legal position is that civil fines are not provided for in Irish law for anti-competitive practices. The Attorney General has previously advised my Department that providing for them would pose legal difficulties having regard to Article...

Written Answers — Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) is the statutory independent body responsible for the enforcement of domestic and EU competition law in the State. Its search powers for the purposes of investigating alleged breaches of competition law are set out in section 37 of the Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2014 (the “2014 Act”).  Section 37 of the...

Written Answers — Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Ticket Touting (3 Oct 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: My predecessor as Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, Mary Mitchell O'Connor T.D., published a consultation paper on the resale of tickets for entertainment and sporting events on 20 January 2017 along with the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport and the then Minister for Tourism and Sport. The 24 responses to the consultation were published on the Department's website on...

Written Answers — Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation: Work Permits Applications (28 Sep 2017)

Frances Fitzgerald: The initial Critical Skills Employment Permit application in this case was refused on the 25/07/2017 on the grounds that the applicant indicated that the foreign national did not possess a third level degree relevant to the employment concerned which is a requirement for this employment permit type.  The applicant was notified of this decision in writing and of their...