Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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240. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the extent to which he expects the island of Ireland in its entirety to remain an attractive location for foreign direct investment post-Brexit and into the future; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [44608/20]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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While COVID-19 is the most significant challenge to our ongoing efforts to sustain and grow foreign direct investment in Ireland, Brexit remains a significant challenge for our economy.

IDA Ireland has been working hard with its client base, over several years, to help mitigate Brexit-related risks that could impact on foreign direct investment in Ireland and to help their clients here respond to any Brexit-related issues they may have. We want overseas firms that already have a presence here to stay well into the future.

In addition, ever since the UK referendum in June 2016, the Agency has been seeking to realise opportunities to attract further Brexit-related investment to Ireland. These efforts have yielded impressive results and the Agency has won 92 Brexit-related investments with an associated jobs potential of 5,900.

Furthermore, the IDA has taken steps to diversify its source markets for foreign direct investment. The Agency has restructured its European operations to treat the UK as a separate market and will also deploy additional resources in the Middle East, Asia and Latin America. The IDA has also opened a new Toronto office, which reflects the strong growth in investment from Canada.

IDA Ireland continues to emphasise the core elements of Ireland’s value proposition for foreign direct investment. Our strengths – including our pro-enterprise policy environment, highly-educated English-speaking workforce and our membership of the European Union – remain attractive to international investors and IDA Ireland will continue to work closely with international clients, from a range of sectors, to attract job-rich investment from overseas firms.

Retaining and strengthening Ireland’s reputation as a first-class destination for foreign direct investment remains fundamentally important to our economic model. I am confident that multinationals will continue to locate or expand further in Ireland in the years ahead.