Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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179. To ask the Minister for Finance the actions he is taking to increase the rate of credit lending to businesses via the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland; the level of take up from the fund by businesses to date; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31869/16]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The provision of low cost, flexible finance to SMEs is a priority for this Government. The Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland (SBCI) was established in 2014 to increase the availability of funding to SMEs at a lower cost and on more flexible terms than has been available in recent times on the Irish market.

It is encouraging to note that to the end of June 2016, the SBCI has lent €347 million to 8,619 SMEs across Ireland. There is a broad geographical spread of the SMEs supported with approximately 85% of them based outside Dublin. The SMEs who received SBCI finance are from a variety economic sectors and employ over 43,000 people across the country.

The SBCI does not lend directly to SMEs and instead lends through partner financial institutions known as on-lenders. The SBCI has established relationships with 7 on-lending partners to date, and this provides significant geographical and sectoral reach for its products. The SBCI now supports a broad range of lending products for SMEs including term lending, leasing, contract hire, fleet finance and invoice discounting. The SBCI is currently in discussions with potential new on-lenders, and it is anticipated that SBCI funding will be available from additional on-lenders in the coming months. 

The SBCI has access to over €1 billion of low cost funding that it will continue to make available to support Irish SMEs and the significant contribution they make to the Irish economy.