Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I agree. Many SMEs have shown incredible adaptability and have been making very significant changes. They are transitioning and we need to support and fund that. One of the problems is that people often get loans only for what they are doing already rather than what they can and want to do, and that is something we need to examine.

We also need to examine our procurement policies and how we reward SMEs that enter new areas. That will be part of the just transition funding that we need to consider.In response to colleagues, I point out that my concern is SMEs. I include social enterprises in that. I believe the Government does as well, though I do not know to what extent social enterprises have benefitted from these schemes.

Another concern is that, without the proper scrutiny, too many of these schemes go to the bigger, surer thing rather than the SME or the company that is trying to do something new. We saw that in Home Building Finance Ireland. That is why the public wants more scrutiny of these areas. That was meant to go to small developers, yet €200 million of it went to developers who advanced purchase agreements with investment funds. We saw the visa dividend scheme, the funding that comes from cash for visas, which is questionable in itself. More than 20% of the money from that scheme is going to investment funds. There is a concern about SMEs getting squashed out.

Another concern I have and speak about in my amendments to this Bill is the inclusion of mid-caps. Why not have this relatively small scheme with €29 million liability and €50 million in total just for SMEs? Mid-caps, according to the definition on the Department's website, have €1 billion to €2 billion in assets. Let us go after the SMEs and maybe even have a scheme specifically for the "S" in "SMEs", the small businesses and enterprises which have done incredible work at local level and been key to the community. I agree they have a social and community development role and I worry that we have had numerous schemes which we have underwritten and we have heard from people across the House that, when it comes to the crunch, SMEs are still being denied funding and loans. These schemes are framed too widely and are not delivering for the core businesses that make up the fabric of the communities and that are on the main streets of towns across Ireland.

I am looking for more thought and engagement, including engagement on all of these schemes with everyone across the Parliament and the Oireachtas. Will the Department please stop keeping all of this in-house and simply presenting it to us for rubber-stamping? Can we have more scrutiny of all of these schemes as they come through so insights can be given and we can have more debate? Specifically, the recovery and resilience strategy certainly needs to come before these Houses.