Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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48. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the extent to which she and her Department continue to monitor impediments likely to impact on business throughout the country with particular reference to the need to ensure the availability of indigenous foreign investment of a business friendly environment with consequent employment opportunities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [43327/17]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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On identifying impediments, one of the primary tools I have as Minister to hear from SMEs, who account for 99.8% of enterprises in Ireland, is through the Advisory Group on Small Business (AGSB). The AGSB was set up to give a greater voice in the development of policy to SMEs. Issues negatively affecting the growth and development of SMEs are identified, and possible solutions are suggested by the Group. My colleague, Minister of State for Trade, Employment, Business, EU Digital Single Market and Data Protection, Pat Breen TD, chairs the group and will ensure we continue to monitor current and impending impediments impacting on business.

Another formal structure is the Retail Consultation Forum. Given the importance of this sector to the economy it was established is to allow key issues of relevance to the retail sector to be discussed, with a view to identifying practical actions which could be taken by Government, or by industry itself, to support the sector with particular emphasis on achieving sustainable jobs growth in the sector.

As well as these formal structures, my Department regularly undertakes consultation exercises on various matters that are open to SMEs and their representative organisations to provide input.

Another method my Department uses to monitor any potential impediments to the business environment is Ireland’s Small Business Act (SBA) Factsheet by the European Commission, the latest annual report being published in November 2016. The Small Business Act for Europe (SBA) is the EU’s flagship policy initiative to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). It comprises a set of policy measures organised around 10 principles.

2016 Report on Ireland:

This 2016 report shows once again that Ireland has one of the most SME friendly environments in the EU.

Ireland features among the top three performers in the EU in two of those ten principles:

- Skills & innovation of SMEs, and

- Single market (Single market refers to the integration and interaction of a countries administration and SME’s to the Single Market).

Ireland performs well above the EU average in three other SBA areas:

- Entrepreneurship

- Second chance, and

- Responsive administration

In addition, my Department, as set out in the Action 166 of the APJ 2016, began monitoring a range of nationally and internationally available indicators to assess national performance across the entrepreneurship ecosystem in order to inform policy relating to new and growing businesses.

The reason behind this measurement exercise was to identify Ireland's international performance in each of the six fields in the ecosystem for entrepreneurship. They are:

1. Culture, human capital and education

2. Business environment and supports

3. Innovation

4. Access to finance

5. Entrepreneurial networks and mentoring

6. Access to markets

By assessing Ireland’s performance in each field through a number of internationally respected entities, we can see the lay of the land in our ecosystem.

When viewed, the measurements show good to excellent performance in a number of fields, particularly Business Environment and Innovation. In the Access to Finance field, it appears that the SME sector, of which entrepreneurs are a cohort, rely heavily on reinvesting profits and inter trade lending. They appear to be below the mean, when compared to their EU counterparts, in accessing finance from banks. This impediment is being addressed by the SBCI and the Credit Guarantee Scheme.

Overall, the picture painted from the indicators shows that Ireland is a positive environment in which to create and operate a business.