Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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17. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the number of new jobs that have been created from the Action Plan for Jobs 2017 (details supplied); the regions, sector and target for 31 December 2017; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [42936/17]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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The Action Plan for Jobs is one of the Government’s key instruments to support job creation. The Action Plan for Jobs process is working. Since the first Plan was launched in early 2012, there are over 225,000 more people at work bringing total employment in the State to almost 2,063,000 by end of Quarter 2, 2017.

The goal of this Government is to support the creation of an additional 200,000 jobs by 2020 with 135,000 outside Dublin. This is a whole of Government effort and is delivered through our integrated Action Plan for Jobs.

There were 14,700 new jobs created in the first three months to 31 March 2017, with a further 3,300 new jobs created between April and the end of 30 June. There is no data available yet for the third quarter of 2017.

Up to Q2 2017, employment grew faster in the regions (2.8%) than in Dublin (1.5%) with four out of five jobs created in the regions. The largest increases were recorded in the information and communications and the construction sectors.

The target number of new jobs to be created in 2017 is 45,000, as of Q2, 40% of this target has been achieved.

I will be working with Ministerial colleagues to ensure that the 2018 Plan is ambitious and impactful and keeps us on track to deliver on both our 2017 and 2020 targets.