Niall Blaney (Fianna Fail)

I thank the Minister of State for coming here today and wish her the best of luck in her new role. I have no doubt that she will do more than well. I am also delighted to see her mum here. She is keeping a close eye, I am sure, full of pride sitting up behind there.

I commend my colleague Senator Ollie Crowe on bringing forward this timely motion. I support the vast majority of what has been said about the supports and the lack of supports for SMEs. I want to focus on sole traders. Sole traders are the backbone of many businesses, such as a local shop that depends on the sole trader to deliver its specialised goods. During Covid, many healthcare professionals such as counsellors and psychologists got no supports. Time on time, budget after budget, year on year, they do not get any change as each budget goes by. The paltry tax allowance they have does not in any way recognise what they contribute to society. The Government really needs to look at this area, because the sole trader in this country plays a key role in many of those small and medium enterprises to ensure they keep going in business. We need to go back to the drawing board in relation to those sole traders. The country is crying out for many different services within the healthcare setting. As we know, many schools are crying out for more psychologists and psychology reports but we are not incentivising people to take up specialty roles on a private basis. They are not taking those roles and are more inclined to go into the private sector or some kind of a business setting. They are a critical part of our society. We need to incentivise sole traders. We need to ensure we have our psychologists and counsellors and all those people out there who are working as specialists. Someone mentioned mechanics. For those who are working on their own, in their own specialised, qualified area, we need to ensure that they are protected because at the moment they are not and many of them are struggling. Many are questioning why they have gone down a certain road, putting so much time and effort into their business but being left behind while others are getting incentives, budget after budget. I ask the Minister of State to put an emphasis on the area of sole traders because they are in special need.