Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Last Thursday, we had an excellent public consultation session here on social enterprise.

I compliment the Seanad on bringing a raft of new people to the Chamber - One Foundation, Social Entrepreneurs Ireland and Ashoka Ireland. They are change makers by nature. It is phenomenal that 28 Senators were present for the entire three-hour session. The organisations suggested wonderful solutions for the social good. Their ideas are proven. CoderDojo was represented by a young man of 20 years of age. Senator Mullins asked him about how he made a living. Many of the people in question rely completely on social enterprise funding. Their ideas will change society forever if they are supported.

Senator Mooney called on the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Deputy Bruton, to attend the House. The Minister should debate with us the benefits of supporting social enterprise and seeing it as mainstream enterprise. It is for the social good and the population gains. We could ask the Minister to introduce legislation on crowd funding so that we might have a reliable means of funding projects.

The increase in the number of people returning to work is good news. Momentum Skills runs a 16-week placement programme along the lines referred to by Senator Mooney, involving four weeks of training and 12 weeks of work placement in the medical secretarial field, business process improvement, warehousing and logistics, etc. People need to be up to date in these fields if they are to have a competitive edge.