Mary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Thank you very much, a Chathaoirligh, for your good wishes.

I welcome the opportunity to address the Seanad today on the important issue of getting people back to work. I look forward to working with the House. I respect the way in which the House does business. This Government's goal is to achieve sustainable full employment. We want all people to have the opportunity to enjoy rewarding work. We want to ensure that all people can participate and contribute their full potential to the economy and society.

The programme for a partnership Government sets our ambition to help create 200,000 additional jobs by 2020. A total of 135,000 of those jobs are to be outside of Dublin. We also want to reduce unemployment to 6%. Our target this year is to add 50,000 new jobs. We have made a good start. More than 15,000 new jobs were created in the first three months of 2016. In early 2012, the first Action Plan for Jobs was launched. At the time, the unemployment rate was above 15.1%. In May this year, it fell to 7.8%. A total of 155,000 more people are in employment today than in 2012. That surpasses the original target to have an extra 100,000 people at work by the end of 2016.

The Government is committed to sustaining the rate of job creation and delivering full employment by 2020. The enterprise agencies of my Department have been pivotal in addressing the jobs challenge in recent years. Employment in Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland-supported companies increased by 22,000 in 2015. The local enterprise offices supported the creation of more than 3,500 new jobs.

I wish to give the message loud and clear that unemployment has declined in all regions since 2012. A total of 20,000 jobs were created in the past year alone outside Dublin.Almost two thirds of the new jobs created by Enterprise Ireland clients in 2015 were outside Dublin and over half of the jobs created in IDA Ireland companies in 2015 were also outside Dublin. However, we cannot be complacent. It is my job to ensure that the jobs go to regional areas.

In 2015, we developed eight regional action plans for jobs to ensure the recovery would be felt in every region. The overall target is to grow employment in each region by 10% to 15% by 2020 and we have set up a regional implementation committee to oversee and drive each plan. The programme for Government also commits to reducing each county's unemployment rate to within 1% of the State average.

The first progress reports on the implementation of the regional action plans will be published in the second half of this year. As I have mentioned, the number of people out of work has declined considerably since its peak in 2012. However, unemployment remains too high. This Government is placing a particular priority on youth unemployed and long-term unemployed. In May of this year, the rate of youth unemployment was 15%, down from 20.8% in 2015. We cannot be complacent about youth unemployment and we must ensure that group is targeted so that it has employment. The number of long-term unemployed declined by 27,000 in the past year. This is, of course welcome. However, I am conscious that we must continue to reduce this number further.

As unemployment continues to fall, it is timely to focus on the quality of employment. The quality of employment is a key determinant of the well-being of individuals and of households. The number of part-time workers increased by 3.7% in the year to the end of March 2016. Women are more likely to work part-time than men. Two thirds of part-time workers are women. In some cases working part-time is by choice. It is positive that we have those flexible opportunities.

There are also people working part-time who would work additional hours if such were available. The number of underemployed part-time workers declined by almost 14% in the past year. Underemployment among women fell by 15.1%. We need to ensure that this trend continues.

Ireland has a comprehensive suite of employment rights legislation. We strongly protect those who work on a part-time basis or on a temporary basis. In the area of zero and low-hour contracts, the Government is preparing an appropriate policy response to the University of Limerick, UL, study. It was essential that stakeholders were given an opportunity to consider and respond to the UL study. The large number of submissions received requires careful consideration by my Department. These submissions will inform the policy response to be considered by Government.

The Low Pay Commission will make its next recommendations on the national minimum wage for 2017 in July. Its recommendations must be evidence-based. We want a minimum wage that is both fair and sustainable. We want to assist as many low-paid workers as is reasonably practicable without creating significant adverse consequences for employment or competitiveness. I look forward to receiving and taking forward that report.

Innovation is at the heart of Government policy for enterprise and creating high-quality jobs. Leadership in science, research and innovation play a crucial role in attracting, developing and nurturing business. They are also essential ingredients in creating and maintaining employment.

Research and development active firms also do better in terms of job creation and exports. Our Innovation 2020 strategy sets out the vision for Ireland to become a global innovation leader. Innovation 2020 is focused both on delivering a strong sustainable economy and a better society. We want to see greater numbers of enterprises engaging in research and development. We need more enterprises progressing to a point where innovation is embedded as a key part of their business model. We have a target to increase our spend on research and development to 2.5% of GNP by 2020. This is a key priority for my Department.

I am acutely aware that the rising economic tide may not yet have reached every business. Through the Action Plan for Jobs, we have made significant progress since 2012 to make it easier for SMEs to do business in Ireland. This strong focus on SME competitiveness and growth will continue.

Creating a fertile environment for entrepreneurship and start-ups is one of my top priorities. This includes targeted actions by El and the LEOs to promote female entrepreneurship. Participation by female entrepreneurs in El's high potential start-up programme increased to 20% in 2015. The target was 18%.

The Action Plan for Jobs is working. However, we cannot be complacent. We remain vulnerable to external shocks. Key among these include Brexit, increases in oil prices and exchange rate movements.

We must protect the gains in competitiveness achieved over the past few years. We have moved to seventh place in IMD global competitiveness rankings but more remains to be done. I will be working with the National Competitiveness Council and my ministerial colleagues to ensure we get progress on the key competitiveness issues. We need to address the issues of costs for business. We need to prioritise action on infrastructure bottlenecks. We need to ensure we have sufficient skills and talent supply.

I have asked my Department to initiate the process to develop the 2017 action plan for jobs. This is now under way. We will be consulting widely with external stakeholders over the coming months. As I said earlier, we want to gather the best ideas for sustainable job creation.

My priority is to deliver a business environment that is among the most competitive internationally. I want to use our collective resources across Government to support enterprise and sustainable employment growth in all of the regions. Through collective action, I am convinced we can achieve sustainable full employment by 2020.

I am delighted to be here. I look forward to hearing the Senators' ideas through this session. I also want Senators to know the door is open in the Department and if we can help, we are there to help. EI, IDA Ireland and the LEOs are all there. I would ask all Senators to familiarise themselves with the plan for their particular region. It is available on the web. If we can help, as I said, we would be delighted to do so.