Gerald Nash (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am pleased to have an opportunity to contribute to this important debate. I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, to the House. I am pleased he enjoyed his recent visit to Drogheda. We hope to see him there again soon.

As stated earlier by colleagues, the Government is by far the largest purchaser of goods and services in our economy, with public procurement alone accounting for approximately 20% of GDP. Given current data, that percentage may need to be recalculated. I look forward to receiving the revised figures. Given the scale and nature of the activity involved, there is a major onus and responsibility on Government to ensure that the opportunities presented by our public procurement processes and the resources available are leveraged in the interests of our indigenous economy and, more broadly, our society.

The State has been criticised, rather unfairly in my opinion, by SME owners and managers and some interest groups in the sector for not doing enough to ensure that contracts are awarded to Irish SMEs. I believe that criticism is wide of the mark. As evident from the figures provided earlier by the Minister, only 7% of our expenditure goes to overseas firms. It is no harm to repeat that time and again to ensure it enters the public consciousness. The figures and the analysis are clear. That is not to say that more cannot be done to leverage opportunities for Irish businesses to grow and develop and seek opportunities through the public procurement process. As mentioned by colleagues, it is often the case that busy SME owners and managers are extremely busy and find the public procurement process a little convoluted, overwhelming and, at times, confusing. I know that efforts have been made by the Office of Government Procurement, OGP, and the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and others to demystify the process and to break down some of the barriers.

The "Meet the Buyer" events initiated over the past few years have been really important and represent crucial fora for the exchange of information and awareness raising among SMEs about the opportunities that exist. Enterprise Ireland and InterTradeIreland have play a particularly important role in ensuring that as much information as possible is available to SMEs that are interested in dipping their toe in the water in terms of the public procurement process. The "Taking Care of Business" events operated by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation have also been important in bringing the message to the regions across the country. The Office of Government Procurement, OGP, has been represented at those events over the past couple of years.

In terms of the way in which we transpose directives, as mentioned by my colleague, Senator Alice-Mary Higgins, the division of the lots or the "explain why not" provision is very important, as is the adjustment in the turnover requirement which generally now is not more than twice the estimated value of the contract. Opportunities are arising all the time for SMEs. We are trying to make the process of accessing public procurement opportunities simpler for SMEs wishing to get involved.

I endorse what Senator Gavan said earlier. It is crucial that we ensure our public procurement rules are leveraged in the public interest and for the public good. The Irish Congress of Trade Unions, ICTU, and others have pointed out how we can have progressive approaches to public procurement by providing where we can - as we do - grounds for exclusion from tendering. In Ireland, a company will be excluded if it has broken child labour laws or has been involved in human trafficking, terrorism or fraud, which are pretty obvious grounds for exclusion. There would be no surprises on that front. However, we have to be much more ambitious about leveraging social clauses for our contracting arrangements. I know that the OGP has established an interdepartmental group on social clauses, involving a range of different agencies and organisations. I support the ICTU approach in terms of the charter published last year that has generated much debate in this House and elsewhere and, importantly, has the support of Members of this and the Lower House. It should be the case that in this country we can use the power of our public procurement system to promote and ensure respect and compliance with our labour laws for collective agreements and fair and decent wages. It is not just good enough to talk about this; we need to be explicit about it in our arrangements.

I am concerned that we still use the statutory instrument system around the transposition of directives relating to public procurement. It is important that we debate properly, and particularly when there are huge public resources involved, how we target and direct our public resources. We all understand that statutory instruments are an important part of our system but fundamentally they do not involve, by definition, debate in these Houses, which I believe is a flawed way of doing business. We can improve the way in which we transpose directives by way of public debate and transparency. We need more public debate on how we direct our scarce but growing resources. The minimalist approach about which Senator Gavan spoke earlier is no longer acceptable in terms of respect for collective agreements and the cause that congress has made. I urge the Minister of State to reflect on the congress document and to discuss it with his officials to ensure that our approach is not minimalist and is much more ambitious in terms of the public good.