Foreign Direct Investment
Dail Éireann — 2025-11-13
============================================================

Peter Burke (FG), Longford-Westmeath

I am happy to work with Deputy Aird in Laois to ensure that Laois continues to grow. We have our advanced planning permit, which we are now working with IDA Ireland and Laois County Council on for our advanced building solution. It is important that we can reduce lead times and give certainty in that regard. We had a great day at Midland Steel, where we have 70 jobs. It is a good example of where Laois is at the cutting edge of innovation in areas that are critical to the supply chain of our economy. There will be significantly more opportunities. About 145 people are employed by IDA companies in Laois, which I know Deputy Aird is a strong supporter of. I am happy to work with the Deputy in the future to ensure that we grow our footprint of foreign direct investment. I am clear that Laois needs to get more. It is absolutely an area that needs to be enhanced and have further growth of employment opportunities. We need to put in the infrastructure, reduce the timelines and reduce uncertainty, as we are planning to do with our advanced permit. I look forward to working with the Deputy in those areas.

---

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/dail/2025-11-13/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-21T01:01:06+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-11-13