Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

I join others in welcoming the Minister of State to the House. As a constituency colleague it would be remiss of me not to congratulate him wholeheartedly and say that the people from all parties in our region are very proud that we have a Minister of State responsible for the very important portfolio of dealing with small business. I wish him and his good offices every success on all our behalf in the years ahead.

I am pleased that he has alluded to the possibility of a guarantee scheme for business and I look forward to getting more detail on that important issue. Even with the office of Mr. John Trethowan and the Credit Review Office, significant problems remain. There are viable businesses with good ideas and if it were not for the draconian criteria currently being adopted by certain financial institutions, they could be up and running and creating employment. Public procurement in this country does not box as clever as in Germany, for example. There, a public servant drives no car other than a Volkswagen or Mercedes, so although we are bound under EU rules, we could be more targeted and clever about how we award contracts while adhering to rules.

I am not sure whether the Minister of State mentioned a strategic investment bank, which is in the programme for Government. The Government should consider using funds from the National Pensions Reserve Fund or elsewhere and making €1 billion or €2 billion or a similarly large sum of money available, not so much as a grant scheme to support industry but for the State to take equity in the small and medium-sized enterprise sector. That would produce dividends for the State in the form of a good return on investment and it would also give a real and quick bounce to that sector.