Donie Cassidy (Fianna Fail)

The Minister of State with responsibility for housing is with us today. A third of all homes built since the foundation of the State were built in the past ten years. That is a record we can stand over and for which we deserve credit. We spent a significant amount on infrastructure in the past ten years which was twice the EU average. The money was spent on schools, roads, rail and health. We restarted the prison building programme, and this summer we will open another 400 spaces. Again we stand over our record and deserve credit in this area.

These individual actions are aimed at improving quality of life, job retention and creation. Until this year we had full employment and turned around the issue of emigration. We deserve credit for that. It is only through employment, enterprise and the income generated by these that we can fund so much else that this Government wants to achieve. We want entrepreneurs, businesses, employees and those seeking to work to know this is our priority.

Leading from this, we have had initiatives such as the enterprise stabilisation fund to help protect jobs in our exporting companies hit by the current difficulties. Due diligence is under way on a scheme for export credit insurance to further assist our exporting companies. There is a commitment by the Government to pay its debts to businesses within 15 days of invoicing. We have sought this on all sides of the House on the Order of Business on various mornings, and I commend the Government for it.

A revamp is under way of our public procurement policy to make it more friendly to small and medium enterprises. New tax changes were introduced to support job creation through the development of intellectual property assets in Ireland. As those involved in the publishing industry know, we are the envy of the world in how strict and up to date the requirements are in our intellectual property rights regulation.

We have spent much time here over the years in order to command the respect of the world. Multinationals such as Hewlett Packard and Intel are giving us so many thousands of jobs because of the serious view which has always been taken by the Government in the protection of intellectual property rights. That has stood us well with the significant number of jobs created in the sector.

There has been an unprecedented level of training and activity measures put in place to assist those seeking employment again. New initiatives have been established to keep people in jobs deemed vulnerable and to get graduates with work experience. All this work has been undertaken at a time of unprecedented change in Ireland. Everybody in the House knows that the stabilisation of our public finances and the resolution of problems in our banking system are key to economic recovery. A combination of tax increases, expenditure reductions and efficiency gains were necessary and had to be put in place.

In 1997, when our Opposition colleagues left office, we had 1.1 million working. It is very regrettable that 400,000 people are currently unemployed but we still have 1.8 million employed today, 700,000 more than we had 12 years ago. All fair-minded commentators and politicians would indicate that we have a great chance of recovery. I understand figures to be released later this afternoon relating to the past two months will be very encouraging for us.

I welcome the assistance of colleagues on all sides of the House in this and continuing debates on the economy and challenges facing the Department of Finance, the Taoiseach and the Government. I welcome the Minister of State present who is listening to our views on the matter.