Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator for raising this issue. This is an area in which I have a great interest. When I was Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation during the previous Government's period, I introduced a national strategy for entrepreneurship in Ireland.This was the first time it had ever been done. This amazed me because, following the difficult period in our history between 2009 and 2014, the teeth of the crash, many people set up their own businesses for the first time. Had they not done so, 100,000 fewer people would be at work. Their impact, even in the worst of times, is significant.

In good times, it is important we nurture entrepreneurship and develop a strategy in that regard. As the Senator rightly acknowledged, part of our action plan for this year is to produce a policy on entrepreneurship. It is important that we do this. We should set a national ambition that it will be part of our DNA to encourage entrepreneurship. One point I learned from my last ministerial job was that a wide range of factors helps a country be entrepreneurial and develop new businesses. One of them is culture and education. Of course, there are the financial services area, access to finance, government policy and so forth. However, the most enduring piece is to have the right attitude in encouraging people to take risks in their lives, cultivate curiosity, as well as the capacity to take on these issues, and that this is done from the earliest stage.

However, against the backdrop of the 2026 target to have the best education and training service in Europe, this is one area in which we need to do better. Ireland is one of the few countries in Europe which has not explicitly developed an educational strategy for entrepreneurship. This needs to be corrected. To be fair, our education system, along with the reforms we have made to it, has greatly cultivated creativity, problem-solving and the sorts of skills which are important to entrepreneurship. These are now embedded in our curriculum. Increasingly in the junior cycle, there is much more emphasis on self-led learning where one is encouraging an entrepreneurial spirit in the learning activity itself.

We have a wide range of excellent initiatives of mini-companies and local enterprise offices cultivating school competitions. There is much extracurricular work in encouraging young people to test their skills in an entrepreneurial environment. We can do more, however. We intend to develop guidelines for schools. Clearly, much can be done within the curriculum itself, along with the promotion of extracurricular activities. We can ensure education recognises the importance of risk-taking in its various curricular activities. It must also increase the exposure to entrepreneurs at an appropriate age. The transition year is a particularly important year when people can get exposure to different experiences. This too should be developed.

I am looking forward to working with experts in the field and practitioners at the coalface to develop a policy which will set us in the right direction for the coming years.