Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is significant that the trend of the debate on this side of the House as much as on the other side has been towards tackling the issue of long-term unemployment. I commend Senator Mary White for highlighting the dire statistics for the second quarter issued by the Central Statistics Office. There are a number of suggestions. However, we have not heard much in recent months about the notion mooted in the House of a venture capital bank. The Minister of State with responsibility for small business, Deputy John Perry, who is from my constituency and a good friend has had personal experience of this as chairman of the Ireland-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Society. That is where I think he got the idea from because the Taiwanese have established such a venture capital bank. There are suggestions that such a bank should be established to help small business as a unit within AIB that would be dedicated to providing venture capital for small and medium-sized enterprises.

There is also a view - I do not necessarily agree with Senator Catherine Noone - that if one pays people, they will remain absent from the workforce. However, economists have proved that at the height of the Celtic tiger when social welfare benefits were at their highest, the rate of unemployment was only 4%. That gives the lie to the view that people did not want to work. When jobs were available, they took them. I do not want to misinterpret what Senator Noone said-----