Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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277. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation if she has assessed how she could rebalance public supports for research and development, given the recent assertion by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development that such supports are skewed towards tax credits and should be rebalanced towards more direct support for domestic small and medium enterprises; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [16470/16]

Mary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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The Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, (OECD), in its Economic Review of Ireland 2015 highlighted that public support for business R&D is increasingly skewed towards R&D tax credits and that government can help strengthen Ireland’s sector by rebalancing its innovation policies towards more direct form of innovation supports.

Innovation 2020 is the Government Strategy on research and development, science and technology and highlights the importance of innovation in enterprise as a competitive advantage for Ireland. This strategy commits to increasing the level of innovation activity within firms and also increasing the number of firms conducting research and development.

My Department is leading on a review of the research, development and innovation supports available to businesses so as to encourage more businesses, particularly small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), to become R&D active.

This project will focus on the R&D activity within firms and understand the challenges facing firms in undertaking innovation activity. It will then map a wide range of research and development supports (which will include the R&D Tax Credit) and then benchmark those internationally so as to ensure that Ireland’s offering is competitive.

This project will then go on to identify opportunities to streamline, strengthen or introduce new research, development and innovation supports that respond to the needs of SMEs and larger companies in Ireland.

This project is a commitment within the Action Plan for Jobs 2016 and will be delivered before the end of 2016.