Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 15 June 2016
217. Deputy Bernard J. Durkan asked the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation if job opportunities will continue to become available during the next five years; the need to ensure an even distribution of economic opportunities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [16309/16]
View answerThe Programme for a Partnership Government sets an ambitious target to have an additional 200,000 at work by 2020, with an unemployment rate of 6 per cent. Achieving this ambitious target is premised on the creation of a range of employment and career opportunities across a broad spectrum of skills across all sectors of the economy, including manufacturing and services activities.
Enterprise 2025, the Government’s long-term enterprise policy was launched in 2015. It is an ambitious strategy, with the objective of delivering growth over the next decade that is sustainable, led by strong export performance, builds on our sectoral strengths, and that is underpinned by innovation, productivity, cost effectiveness and competitiveness.
It is our aim to build resilience into our economy so that we do not suffer again as we have done in the past. As a small open economy Ireland’s success will be dependent on driving export led growth and growing the additional indirect jobs stimulated by the activities of exporting enterprises in the wider economy. We will continuously monitor our employment growth patterns in terms of an export/non-export ‘balance’ to avoid the mistakes of the past.
The focus on job creation is a government wide agenda, and it involves:
- achieving a leap forward in the capacity and the performance of enterprises based here/and in attracting further investment. We will put in place an extra €500 million in capital funding to accelerate export led jobs growth across Ireland’s regions;
- focusing investments in areas where Ireland can differentiate itself internationally - specifically education and skills, creating attractive places to live and work throughout the country and supporting enterprise innovation; and
- improving the environment for business and maintaining a focus on protecting our national competitiveness from unsustainable cost growth.
To deliver on this ambitious target, in the Programme for Partnership Government we commit to maintaining the OECD endorsed Action Plan for Jobs Process that will set out, on an annual basis, the best ideas for job creation within available resources.
Building on this process, we are focused on ensuring that we can support new job creation in every region in the country over the next five years, through the implementation of the Regional Action Plans for Jobs. A key objective of the plans is to have a further 10 to 15 per cent at work in each region by 2020.
The Regional Action Plans are being driven in each region by Regional Implementation Committees. Funding of up to €250 million to support the Regional Action Plan process is being provided. This includes a €150 million Regional Property Programme being delivered by IDA and a range of competitive regional funding calls rolled out by Enterprise Ireland on a phased basis. The first Progress Reports on the implementation of the Plans, covering the period to end-June 2016, will be completed and published in Q3 2016.
