Emer Currie (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I extend a very big welcome to the Minister of State, Deputy English, and congratulate him on his new position.

I very much welcome the debate on the microfinance Bill and I support the Bill. I welcome the focus on the July jobs stimulus and on SMEs. It is great to hear people talk about SMEs in such a familiar way. We are all connected to SMEs, which employ 1.3 million out of 2.3 million workers. Chambers Ireland has released research showing that 85% of SMEs faced some sort of closure during the restrictions and that the overheads they faced were on average still approximately €2,000 per month. Their restock average, that is, the cost to get them reopened, was between €3,000 and €8,000. On top of that they have to pay their staff and themselves. This is therefore a critical time for them. We have to help them reopen, keep them open and help them pay their wages. It will be a very precarious situation over the next six months.

We have seen €6.5 billion go into these supports. I think they have been very effective but I also welcome the opportunity to review and enhance them, particularly as people have commented today on the 44% approval rate for the microfinance loan. That means 3,472 applications were not approved. These 3,472 businesses, and the jobs that go with them, need our support.I am very much in favour of enhancing these supports, extending the TWSS to help to bridge the gap between getting up and running and being able to pay the wages, the extension of the waiver of the commercial rates and an examination of the product details on this particular loan.

The Minister of State asked for ideas regarding the July stimulus. Somebody commented earlier on these businesses being up for the challenge, which they are. I did a walk through of the local businesses in Castleknock, Blanchardstown and Clonsilla and spoke to the local business owners. They were both excited to get back to work and nervous. We need a national support local campaign. There are support local campaigns happening but we need a big focus on a national support local campaign. This is the next stage of the recovery. We have been through all of this together and people still want to support their local businesses and communities. We have to mobilise people to get behind their communities and join the dots in putting money into the local businesses that they walked past when they were closed during lockdown and they looked forward to the day that they were back. We have to remind the people that they need our support and join the dots between the local businesses, the local community and the national economy. Bringing that into focus, if every adult in Ireland was to divert €20 for the next 12 weeks into their local economy, it would amount to a crucial €875 million injection into our national economy. I am involved in a support local campaign. The strength of it was not only that it was about the retail shops. While it is about communities, it is bigger than that; it is about creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship. That umbrella effect could be powerful for us right now in the next stage of the recovery.

The second issue I want to mention is our youth. It has been identified that an aspect of the July jobs stimulus that will be retraining of young workers. We have seen the respect for front-line workers over the past while. It is front and central, as it should be. I hope that there will be an opportunity in the stimulus plan to bring some of our youth into that sector in a stable and attractive way. There is so much focus in the programme for Government on the care sector and I would like to see that delivered on early through more youths going into care assistant and home care roles or even being taken on as additional staff that schools and crèches will need.

The third and final issue I will mention is remote working. Extraordinary changes have happened in extraordinary times but now we need ordinary practices for ordinary times if we are to retain them. More than one third of us have been working from home with in excess of 50% of us wanting to retain that option. To ensure quality of life opportunities for rural areas and to regenerate communities, including suburban communities such as my own, we need incentives for employers and grants towards employee assistance programmes and mental health and well-being. It is something I have mentioned previously and that I put forward as an idea in the programme for Government. We need a national campaign on how employers can operate remotely and the assistance that is available. One-to-one assistance through Grow Remote is available as well as training programmes. I urge the Government to encourage employers to advertise a remote working option. That is a simple thing that could be done where one's location on a job specification suddenly becomes "remote".

There has been an increase in the use of hubs or co-working spaces in Ireland in the past three years. They have been an energiser for local communities. They are in a difficult position at present but they are something that we should support so that they are still here at the end of this pandemic. If we can bring remote working to rural Ireland, then that will give us more jobs in rural areas and more options and flexibility for people.