Budget 2026 (Enterprise, Tourism and Employment): Statements Seanad Éireann — 2025-10-14 ============================================================ Noel O'Donovan (FG), Nominated by the Taoiseach I thank the Senator for his kind offering. Like other speakers, I want to commend the Minister on his work on this budget. It is a prudent budget and what we have come to expect from the Minister, Deputy Paschal Donohoe. The Minister said in his contribution that there are 2.82 million people in work. When I left college in 2011, the jobs market was quite bleak. We can never forget where we have come from and where we are now. People have a reason to get up in the morning, go to work and earn a fair living to support themselves and their families. It is a major hallmark that we should never forget. The Minister referenced the 9% VAT rate, something for which he has campaigned for a long number of years. West Cork has a large number of businesses that have engaged with me on this issue and will benefit from the VAT reduction. They are busy businesses. I have continually made the point that businesses have extremely high footfall, yet are still struggling. As Senator Scahill said, we need to be even more proactive in the months and years ahead. We need to ask these businesses questions and listen to them. Local enterprise offices can play a role. They arrange conferences, meetings and workshops, but there is a benefit to knocking on the doors of businesses and asking them questions. I have some suggestions for next year's budget. The town of Bandon is currently going through major public realm work, which is welcome and transformative for the town. During the process, however, businesses have suffered in terms of footfall and revenue, yet the local authority has very little discretion in terms of a rates waiver. The car park in Bandon has been finished. There is scope at ministerial level for the Minister for local government and local authorities to ensure that when works commence in a town there is discretion to support businesses. We will see similar in the town of Bantry shortly, which will undergo flood culvert works. Again, the town and businesses will need support. I suggest we support our chambers of commerce and business associations in the work they do to support businesses in towns. We have seen how well the support for agricultural shows has worked throughout the country, which have been given €5,000, €6,000 or €7,000. Our business associations support businesses in towns, including with Christmas lights and various events. A body of work could be done to look to next year's budget to support the chambers of commerce and businesses and communities. I commend the budget and the work of the Minister. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2025-10-14/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:13+00:00 Sitting date: 2025-10-14