asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he will give an update on the progress of the IDA programme, under paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery, for selective development of certain firms.
2.
Ceisteanna — Questions. Oral Answers. - Company Development Programme.
1.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the number of firms selected for special development under paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery.
20.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if firms selected for expansion and growth by the IDA in accordance with paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery are receiving preferential treatment in terms of time devoted to their problems; and, if so, the reason the identity of the firms is being kept confidential.
21.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the number currently employed in the firms selected for expansion and growth under paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery (a) at the present time and (b) at the time the programme was commenced.
26.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he plans to conduct an objective review of the workings of paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery; and if he has any estimate of the cost in terms of time and money diverted from the normal operations of the agencies under the aegis of his Department as a result of the operation of this scheme of special help for selected firms; if he will indicate the procedures and criteria whereby these firms were selected; if any firms selected originally have since dropped out of the programme; and if any others have been added.
30.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the number of jobs created since its inception, under the provisions of paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery, in firms selected for special treatment by State agencies under his aegis; and the number of jobs lost in the firms in question.
33.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he has been monitoring the performance of the company development plan approach which has been adopted by the IDA in recent years; if he will give an indication of its impact on the source of new job creation; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
46.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he will indicate the sectors in which firms selected by the IDA for special company development are operating.
I propose to take questions Nos. 1, 2, 20, 21, 26, 30, 33 and 46 together.
Paragraph 11 (ii) of the Programme for National Recovery refers to the market-oriented and technological development of indigenous manufacturing industry with particular reference to the expansion and growth of selected Irish companies firmly rooted in the economy.
This objective is being promoted through a more selective approach on the part of the State agencies involved in industrial development. Moreover, the appointment of Ministers with specific responsibility for trade and marketing and science and technology is designed to focus more clearly the national effort in strengthening industry's capabilities in these areas. At present, the principal instrument at the level of the individual firm for furthering the objective is the company development programme, operated by IDA in close association with CTT and EOLAS.
Following publication of the White Paper on Industrial Policy in July 1984 the company development programme became an integral part of the IDA's operations in 1985. Under the programme the IDA and the other agencies work with firms as a catalyst to draw up strategic development plans which are designed to lead to substantial growth in terms of output and jobs.
Selection for participation in the programme is a joint process between the company and the State agencies and is based on the company's potential for substantial growth and a willingness to make a significant commitment to the success of the programme.
By end 1987, 200 companies, of which three-quarters are Irish-owned, had undertaken formal company development programmes. Up to 40 companies normally participate in the programme at any one time. For reasons of commercial confidentiality, the identity and details of participating companies are released only when the development plan comes to fruition. Participating firms range across all manufacturing sectors. The natural resources area predominates but there is a good representation by companies in electronics, engineering and consumer products.
All companies receiving assistance from the State are treated equally. The level of time and resources devoted to any one firm is related specifically to that firm's needs and potential.
With effect from this year the IDA have made extensive changes to their priorities and structure to meet the employment objectives set out in the Programme for National Recovery. A completely new Irish industry directorate has been set up to bring a more creative and specialist approach to the challenge of securing more investment, exports and jobs from mainstream Irish industry. Within the directorate a separate division has been established to focus exclusively on the company development programme.
The IDA's 1988 annual employment survey is being compiled at present. The results will point to the progress being achieved by the company development programme and other measures to enhance industrial development.
Regular progress reports on the work of the CDP are provided to my Department. The programme was considered in some detail in the context of the review of industrial performance 1986 and will be considered again by my Department when a similar review takes place in 1989.
May I ask the Minister——
I propose to call Deputies in the order in which their questions appear on the Order Paper. I am calling Deputy Sheehan.
Would the Minister be more specific and spell out to the Members of this House the names and addresses of those firms incorporated in the company development programme?
I have already stated that as normal, the names of the firms while participating in the programme, are kept on a confidential basis but are released after each company's programme has been completed.
Why the cloak of secrecy before that?
Of the 160 firms which appear, from the Minister's reply, to be out of their period of special development, has he applied measures of performance to those companies to ascertain whether the company development plan was a success over and above those who remained outside it so that we could ascertain whether this is a successful approach to industrial development?
I can tell the Deputy that, by and large, the programme has been successful, not 100 per cent successful. Naturally, as we receive reports from time to time we are constantly monitoring them and, when we ascertain from experience that there is need for some fine tuning or adjustment, that is done.
Has the Minister, if you like, fixed controls on which he could report to this House on a regular basis as to the success or otherwise of this programme?
Regular reports are furnished to my Department where they are monitored. I might add that details appear in the annual report of the IDA each year in relation to the companies involved.
How many jobs have been created under this programme and how many have been lost in the firms in question?
That is a separate question.
It is not a separate question. I might refer the Minister to Question No. 33.
We do not have details in relation to the specific programme.
Yes, but Question No. 33 is one of the questions on which the Minister is now answering supplementaries. The Minister was asked this question four days ago. Perhaps he could answer it.
Which one?
No. 33.
I will look at it and ascertain what is in it.
(Limerick East): The Minister's mind is wandering to other Departments.
That is understandable.
The Minister would do better to do the job he is paid to do.
Oh, I have no doubts about the job I am paid to do and I am doing it to the best of my ability. Would the Deputy read out the question if he has it?
My Question No. 33 reads:
To ask the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he has been monitoring the performance of the company development plan approach which has been adopted by the IDA in recent years; if he will give an indication of its impact on the source of new job creation; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
The questions in front of me have been tabled by Deputies Naughten, Boylan, Liam Burke, P.J. Sheehan, Griffin, Flanagan, Flaherty and Richard Bruton.
Yes, the last is mine.
Perhaps the Minister would answer the question: how many jobs have been created under this programme and how many jobs have been lost in the firms concerned?
The Deputy knows quite well from his previous experience as Minister for Industry and Commerce that there is not the exact detail he is seeking available in regard to the sectoral jobs. I appreciate his reason for tabling such a question. I will give the total of jobs created when replying to later questions. The Deputy knows as well as I do that such detail is not available and, if it were, I would be the first to supply it.
What we are doing here is asking questions about 200 firms which had been specifically selected by the IDA on the direction of the Government. What I would like to know is how many jobs have been created and how many jobs have been lost in those firms? Are more people employed now in those firms than there were when the programme was initiated? That is a very simple and legitimate question to ask which even the Minister in his present preoccupied state might find it in his heart to answer.
I would not have to find it in my heart to answer that question ——
Your head will do.
—— because the Deputy knows as well as I do that that kind of information is not available and is never tabulated in the form he outlined in his question. Secondly, the question to which the Deputy is trying to get an answer does not appear on the Order Paper. The Deputy is asking how many jobs have been created and how many have been lost but no such questions to that effect appear on the Order Paper. The Deputy in his question asks if I would give any indication of its impact on the source of new job creation but as the Deputy is aware in a three year company development plan the results will not become apparent for a number of years afterwards. An overall assessment was carried out under the review of the industrial performance and this will be repeated in the same exercise next year. That is when the information will become available. The Deputy knows this better than I do.
The answer is that no new jobs——
Order, please. I call on Deputy Martin Cullen.
Is it not the case that no new jobs have been created?
There is no need for the Deputy to become disorderly.
If the results were favourable, the Minister would give them.
Information on jobs will come later and the Deputy will have all the time in the world to ask all the questions he likes.
Deputy Cullen has been called.
I am asking about the number of new jobs which have been created and lost in these specific 200 firms.
That is a separate question.
It is not.
No question has been tabled which asks about the number of jobs created in a specific sector.
The Minister has not been briefed.
If the Deputy would like an answer to that question he should put down a question to that effect.
The Minister has not read his brief.
I know it off by heart.
Deputy Cullen.
Can the Minister tell us in respect of the 200 companies he has referred to what emphasis has been placed on research and development and if any attempt has been made to pool resources such as computer technology which could prove useful to all of them? Is this happening and if so, where?
My colleague, the Minister of State with responsibility for science and technology, will answer part of the Deputy's question when he comes to reply to a separate question. In the company development programme agencies such as CTT, EOLAS, the Irish Goods Council, the IDA and so on have an input. If any weaknesses are detected by any of the agencies, it is addressed. An audit is carried out on the technological base of the company and the capabilities of the company of moving towards a higher technological base. This audit is carried out by EOLAS. In a reply to a separate question later, my colleague, the Minister of State with responsibility for science and technology will provide more details.
I understand the Minister as saying in a reply to a previous supplementary question that statistics and details of jobs are never kept in respect of such employment. Is he seriously suggesting in respect of these 200 firms that it is not intended even to find out if the scheme has been a success, by way of monitoring employment? Is this going to be monitored and, if so, when will the first figures become available?
If the Deputy listened to my comprehensive answers——
I listened very carefully.
—— he would know that there are 200 firms involved, 48 at any given time. The reports are studied in the Department. In respect of the supplementary asked by Deputy Bruton let me say that he had not tabled a specific question and if he had he would have received an answer.
The Minister should take a look at Question No. 30 which asks the Minister to indicate the number of jobs which have been created and lost.
The Deputy is anticipating the reply to another question.
(Interruptions.)
Question No. 3 in the name of Deputy Garret FitzGerald.
In view of the fact that the Minister has failed to answer Question No. 30 which he is purporting to answer and in view of the fact that he has failed to give any information as to the number of jobs created and lost in these firms I propose to raise this matter on the Adjournment.
I will communicate with the Deputy.
The Minister is deliberately refusing to answer the question. He is sidetracking.
Question No. 3.
3.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the number of jobs lost in each manufacturing sector since the inception of the Programme for National Recovery; and if he will ensure that all references to jobs created under the programme in official statements will take due account of jobs lost.
4.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the reason the Government present their job targets in gross rather than net terms; and if the use of gross targets tends to focus undue attention on new firms to the detriment of existing ones.
15.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if the job targets of his Department take adequate account of job losses.
48.
asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce the reason the job targets in the Programme for National Recovery are gross targets and take no account of job losses in the sectors in question.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 3, 4, 15 and 48 together.
The Programme for National Recovery specifies as an objective of policy for the manufacturing and international services sectors the creation of 20,000 extra jobs on average per year over the next ten years, the actual provision accelerating as the programme's policies take effect. In relation to job losses, the programme says clearly that the offsetting trend in job losses in these sectors cannot be foreseen accurately. I am confident that the major improvement in the overall business climate and the specific policy initiatives being taken under the programme to further the development of the indigenous industrial sector will be such as to make existing jobs more secure.
Statements in relation to job creation developments under the programme relate to performance against the targets set under the programme. The Labour Force Survey for mid April 1988 showed no decrease in manufacturing employment compared with the corresponding figure for 1987 while an increase of 10,000 jobs was recorded in services. Pending the completion of the IDA's 1988 employment survey, there are no figures available on job losses in individual manufacturing sectors.
Would the Minister accept that the only relevant and meaningful figure is the one for the net increase in employment in any given sector and that to attempt to use the figure for the gross increase while not taking into account the figure for job losses is misleading to use a polite word?
The programme stated quite clearly that it was not possible to estimate accurately how many job losses there would be but let me give the Deputy the up to date figures so as to provide the full picture and so that he can make an overall judgment. On the basis of the surveys which had been carried out, the position is, up until September of this year, that 12,500 jobs had been created by the IDA; 1,958 in the SFADCo territories and 485 in the Gaeltacht territories, giving a total of 14,950. Let me also refer the Deputy to the figure for notified redundancies to the Department of Labour in the manufacturing sector which totalled 7,738. Therefore, it is quite clear that the rate of closures and job losses has been stabilised and that there has been a net increase. All of the surveys show this trend quite clearly.
Is the Minister suggesting that the only jobs lost are through redundancies?
What I am saying is that when the IDA publish the results of the annual survey the Deputy will get the full picture. I have given the Deputy the total number of new jobs created at 14,950 and I have also given him the figure for the number of redundancies in the manufacturing sector as notified to the Department of Labour. I can only give the statistics and figures which are available to me.
May I take it that the Minister is not suggesting that that is the figure for total job losses which I believe is much higher?
I am not suggesting that but what I am suggesting, and I am sure the Deputy will agree with me, is that the results of all the recent surveys show an upward trend.
(Limerick East): That is not right.
This trend is very clear from the surveys. I am talking about jobs in the manufacturing sector and I have given the number of redundancies in that sector. We can clearly see what the position is. There has been a net increase which is in contrast with the position we had to deal with over the last number of years.
My final point is that the fall in unemployment began in 1985 and the decline in unemployment is due to the policies of the previous Government. We have been in the process of restabilisation and growth in employment since 1985, not, as the Minister would seem to be suggesting, since 1987.
The Deputy is always a good man at twisting statistics but one would really have to turn that statistic on its head to be able to draw that conclusion.
I am quoting the figures from a Government report issued in August.
The Deputy should read the Labour Force Survey and he will see that there has been an increase of 10,000 in the number employed in services.
Could the Minister turn his attention to Question No. 4 on today's Order Paper? Would he agree that the Government set targets for agencies in regard to the number of new jobs to be created only, while ignoring the number of jobs lost, with the result that agencies such as the IDA and SFADCo devote a disproportionate amount of their time to the problems of new and expanding firms and little or no time to firms where the task is to maintain existing jobs rather than to create jobs? If the Government were to change their targets and set them in terms of net job increases in particular sectors to take account of both job losses and job gains, would the Minister agree that this would lead to a more balanced work practice by the agencies concerned?
I appeal for brevity. Brief and precise questions, please.
I have listened with interest to the Deputy's question. What the Deputy is really asking is this: will you set targets for job losses? The aim of this Government is to set targets to increase net employment and not to set targets for job losses. The Deputy and everybody in this House know full well that jobs were lost in this country over a number of years because of the uncompetitive position of the Irish economy. That is an established fact of life and nobody will deny it. It is also an established fact of life that, since this economy was pulled together, since inflation has been brought down to under 2 per cent — and incidentally inflation across the water is two-and-a-half times greater than it is here and rising — and since inflation rates have come down——
Who brought them down?
——and there are five percentage points between here and the UK and since the Government, various Ministers and I took firm decisions to push down industrial costs, jobs have been saved. That is why we now have stabilisation in the economy and are beginning to move in an upward trend. That is the reality of the situation. I have no intention of setting job loss targets because my target is to make sure that there are no job losses if at all possible.
Deputy Martin Cullen.
May I ask the Minister——
Order, please. I have called Deputy Martin Cullen. I am sorry, Deputy Bruton.
Because the Minister was able to tell us specifically the number of jobs lost in the manufacturing sector, can I ask him, in relation to the figure of 14,950 jobs, to identify within that figure how many of those are manufacturing jobs which have been created? Are they all manufacturing jobs?
Which figure?
The 14,950 jobs which have been created between IDA, SFADCo and the Gaeltacht. Seeing that the Minister was able to give us a figure for redundancies in manufacturing, can he say how many of those jobs are specifically manufacturing jobs?
I would give the Deputy the answer to that if he had put down a question. If the Deputy wants to put down a question, no doubt he will get an answer to it. I am giving all the information I have available based on the question asked.
May I ask the Minister how many of the 14,950 jobs he referred to are like the ones he announced this week in Cork where the people who went to the firm in question discovered that the firm which the Minister said was going to increase employment were actually planning to lay off 26 employees?
Deputy Bruton, what you are now displaying and what you are doing is disorderly.
Would the Chair not agree that it is disorderly for a Minister to make misleading announcements——
Please, Deputy Bruton, do not try to circumvent the ruling of the Chair in that fashion.
——of the kind he made in Cork when he indicated that a firm were creating jobs, thereby encouraging people to seek employment with that firm, at a time when they were actually proposing to lay off employees?
The Deputy is raising a specific matter worthy of a separate question.
The Deputy is not interested in specifics.
The Minister has claimed that 14,000 new jobs——
Please, Deputy Bruton.
This is the type of announcement we are talking about.
The Deputy should read my script rather than some newspaper report. The script is a little more authentic. If the Deputy had bothered to read it before he tried to bring up this misleading information here, he would know the answer and would not be making a fool of himself.
I am not relying only on The Cork Examiner; the Meath Weekender also has a report on the Minister's announcement.
Question No. 5.
None of those statements is authentic. That is not what I said.
New jobs already filled.
Please, Deputy Bruton.
I am not responsible for newspaper reports.
(Interruptions.)
If this kind of disorderly conduct continues I will suspend questions for today.
That would be very serious.
It would be serious.
A Cheann Comhairle, can I be helpful to the Deputies in suggesting that every script which I issued this year in relation to jobs is circulated and is available for Deputies who want to read it. They will find in every single announcement I made that I made a clear distinction between when the jobs would be created and what they were, and if there were 20 jobs already in place I said so. The scripts are available for anybody who wants to read them.
Sorry, Minister, I have called the next question.