Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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475. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the uptake of all Brexit related supports under the remit of her Department in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [3699/20]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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Brexit remains a top priority and my Department and its agencies have put in place a broad suite of schemes, supports and advisory resources to encourage and help businesses to prepare for the end of the Brexit transition period.

The Local Enterprise Offices (LEOs) are active across all counties and are working with enterprises across a broad range of sectors to ensure that they are informed about Brexit and have plans in place to manage new trading relationships on the island and with the UK more generally. To date, there have been 7,040 participants at LEO Brexit Information Events and 1,381 mentoring participants focused solely on Brexit. There have also been 1,720 participants in the customs training programme that the LEOs have rolled out for all businesses, exporters and importers, in conjunction with Enterprise Ireland.

Enterprise Ireland (EI) is also providing Brexit-specific supports such as: the running of Brexit advisory clinics, at which there has been over 1,200 attendees to date; the EI Brexit “Act On Programme” which is a support funding the engagement of a consultant to devise a report with recommendations to help clients address weaknesses and improve resilience, and 359 "Act on" Plans have been completed to date; and the Enterprise Ireland Clear Customs Grant, to which there has been 250 applications made to date to access financial support through the scheme.

InterTradeIreland (ITI) has a focus on cross border trade in Ireland and provides a number of Brexit supports, including a Brexit advisory service. 5,416 SMEs directly engaged with the Brexit Advisory Service in 2019 and this is in addition to the 4,175 engagements in 2018.

ITI also supports businesses through Brexit planning vouchers, worth up to €2,250. These vouchers enable businesses to get professional advice on how best to plan and prepare for the UK's withdrawal from the European Union and advice on specific areas such as tariffs, currency management, regulatory and customs issues and movement of labour, goods and services.  To date 1,837 of such vouchers have been approved. Furthermore, in March 2019, ITI launched a Brexit implementation voucher, which provides financial support up to €5,625 with ITI paying 50% of total expenditure. This allows businesses to implement critical changes making them better prepared to deal with a new trading relationship. To date 44 such vouchers have been approved.

The Brexit Loan Scheme was launched at the end of March 2018, using a combination of Irish Exchequer and EU guarantees, it leverages up to €300 million of lending at a maximum interest rate 4% at a cost to the Exchequer of €23 million – €14 million provided by my Department and €9 million provided by Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. To date 889 applications have been approved for eligibility and 236 loans have been progressed to sanction at bank level to a value of €49.57 million. To date there have been 173 repeat eligibility applications.

The Future Growth Loan Scheme opened for applications through the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland in April of 2019. The scheme provides a longer-term facility, 8 to 10 years, and using a combination of Irish Exchequer and EU guarantees, it leverages up to €300m to support strategic capital investment for a post-Brexit environment by business at competitive rates. To date 2,980 applications have been approved for eligibility and 1,010 have been progressed to sanction at bank level to a value of €207.95 million.

The table below sets out the update of Brexit preparedness supports available through my Department and its agencies as of March 2020 (unless otherwise indicated).

Brexit preparedness supports - uptake of available schemes