Mary White (Fianna Fail)

What is needed are high-value, knowledge-intensive activities that can support high-value jobs and relatively high wage rates. The companies that provide such jobs are intensely market-focused and innovative, providing new and proprietary products and services at premium rates. The challenge for indigenous companies, both established and emerging, is to transform themselves sufficiently quickly into innovative and productive enterprises. I can speak from my own experience, having started in Connie Doody's kitchen with our Lir chocolates brand. We employ 90 people from Christmas to Easter. Indigenous companies will not survive unless they innovate. As Mr. Jim Power said, they have to be competitive in the face of rising costs while trying to improve their margins at the same time, without putting up prices. That is a serious challenge and I would like the Minister to reflect on it in his enterprise portfolio.

The Government's role is to provide the proper infrastructure in which to do business. A proper immigration policy is necessary and this is a very serious issue. Jim Power also said that foreign direct investment will be much more difficult to get. However, I believe it is critical, as Senator McDowell has said, to develop indigenous industry. The objective should be to get it to be the cornerstone in areas that have not been touched by foreign investment, around the Wexford and Waterford regions, for example. Jim Power also suggested this approach. I suggest to Senators Phelan and Cummins that if one is taking this motion seriously, one should look at how one can develop one's own area.