Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I know Deputy Michael Ahern has his heart in the right place.

In recent times I have been invited to speak in different parts of the world on the subject of customer service. On every occasion what my listeners really wanted to find out about was the success of the Celtic tiger. When I was going to Argentina last year, Senator Mary White provided me with a copy of a book written by her husband, Padraic White, and Ray MacSharry about the success of the Celtic tiger. I recommend this book as essential reading for everybody in business in Ireland and for all civil servants. It is written like a novel and tells the story of how the Celtic tiger started and developed and lists the elements that achieved success. The only danger is that when I was speaking to people in different parts of the world who wished to hear about the success of the Celtic tiger, I was speaking to our competitors. I am travelling to Estonia soon where I am to speak on the topic of customer service but what they would really like to hear about is how we achieved it and how they can replicate it. Estonia has a company tax rate of 0% as an incentive.

The two most important factors in attracting new investment to Ireland have nothing directly to do with IDA Ireland, although I hope it would support my analysis. The IDA will do the best possible job with the hand it is dealt but it cannot work miracles and we would be exceedingly foolish if we base our expectations on such a belief. Competitiveness and education are the two most important factors and these have been referred to by the Minister of State in his remarks. If these factors are not present, then nothing else matters. We will not succeed in attracting new investment from outside the country. This point bears repeating because the message is not getting through to the point where action is taken. Even the dogs in the street know that Ireland in now a very expensive place in which to do anything.

Foreign direct investment has been encouraged for the past 40 years and initially Ireland was marketed as a low-cost location. In those days everything about Ireland was cheap in the sense that everything was low-priced, such as labour costs and the basic business overheads such as energy costs and taxes. Added to this was one of the lowest rates of corporate tax in the world and so Ireland provided a very attractive package.