I am very pleased to have an opportunity to speak on recent developments in Northern Ireland and the opportunities that now arise for more collaboration, cross-Border trade and political co-operation on many levels. The restoration of the assembly and the Executive is an extremely welcome development for Northern Ireland but also for the island as a whole and for British-Irish relations. We are ready to engage constructively with the Executive to assist each other and work together in areas where North-South co-ope…

The Deputy is more disciplined than we are anyway.

Article 4 of the EU directive on adequate minimum wages, promotion of collective bargaining on wage setting, aims to promote collective bargaining on wages in all member states. The directive requires member states in which the collective bargaining coverage rate is less than 80% to provide “for a framework of enabling conditions for collective bargaining” and to publish an action plan to promote collective bargaining. The 80% threshold is an indicator triggering the publication of an action plan and not a mandator…

First, we have not set targets. We have only started the process of real engagement and consultation. That real engagement will only get started in a meeting next month. We have had some initial discussions, and obviously accept the Government's responsibilities in putting an action plan together. However, it is important to say we are a long way short of that 80% figure. Ireland's economy is different from many other economies around Europe. There is not the same demand for union membership and representation in s…

Fair enough.

I will try to drag it out as long as I can. I am good at that, as you know.

I hear the Deputy, and she takes a view that is consistent with trade union leadership, which is fair enough. The conversations between the different social partners have actually been constructive. The Minister of State, Deputy Richmond, and I have been involved in those discussions. The Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, is involved in that too. The approach the Government is taking is delivering on the commitments we have made to put an action plan in place. I think there will be a lot of discussion and engagem…

I thank the Deputy and I am glad to have the opportunity to update the House because, to be fair to the WRC, it has concluded its work and I have seen a draft copy as of yesterday. The Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Act was enacted on 4 April 2023 and represents a significant advance in terms of workplace entitlements for all employees, parents and carers in particular. The right to request remote working will be available to all employees under the Act. The right to request flexible working arrange…

There is a sense of urgency, but we also want to get this right. We set a very clear target that the WRC would report back to me with a code of practice by the end of January and that is what happened. I need to fully consider it now, which we are doing and we will get that done quickly. The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, also has to do that under the legislation. We will finalise it and it will be a code of practice that will be in use under the legislation. We are on time, we are doing it and there is a sense of urge…

It was completed.

We only got the draft code back ten days ago. We are now looking to approve that code and we are testing it, as the Deputy would expect in any process, before finally approving it and publishing it. It is probably a matter of days before that happens. We are now in a good place. We are moving towards putting a lot more structure, permanency and acceptance around how arrangements for flexible working and remote working are going to work. This is a challenging thing to get right. I speak to other Ministers, employers…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 5, 17, 20 to 22, inclusive, 25, 26, 32 and 38 together. To give a direct answer on Clare, we think that 3,955 businesses will potentially benefit. I will now answer the question more broadly because other Deputies have questions in this regard. The increased cost of business grant, announced in budget 2024, is intended to benefit particularly small and medium sized businesses operating from a rateable premises. The grant is intended to aid firms that have been affected by rising cos…

Yes.

There were a lot of questions there and I will go through them. First, I refer to the Deputies who have raised their areas. From a Cork perspective, in Cork County Council, we expect that 15,718 businesses may be eligible. In Cork City Council, the figure is 6,857. Therefore, across Cork city and county, there are approximately 23,000 businesses that may be eligible. These are not small numbers. In Dublin City Council the number is 17,558; in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council it is 4,409; and in Fingal County C…

I will finish on this. Sorry.

I will leave that last question to Deputy Calleary, seeing as he was specifically asked about it.

We are very reliant on the local authorities to get this payment out as quickly as possible. They have been hugely helpful. The CCMA and the LGMA have been very helpful. This was a big ask of them with very little notice, in truth. We put this scheme in place at budget time. It involved a lot of money going out to a lot of businesses in a relatively short space of time and it became very clear that we could not do it before the end of the year, which we would have liked to do. What the local authorities and the Dep…

We can have another go at it, perhaps with a slightly different slant, because it is a good question. I propose to take Questions Nos. 6, 9 and 35 together. I assure the Deputy that the Government is committed to backing business and will continue to work closely with SMEs nationwide by supporting their growth, helping them to find new markets and stimulating job creation. I know that at present SMEs in certain sectors are facing several challenges due, in particular, to rising energy costs, inflation, a tight labo…

I hear the concern regarding the hospitality and food sector. I have seen that for myself. We have seen some quite high-profile cafés and restaurants going out of business. Let me set the context. It is important to say this. Considerably more businesses are being set up than are closing down. Last year, five times as many businesses were set up as were lost. That being said, in recent months the Department has looked at the combined cost pressures of policy changes and how they apply to different sectors in the Ir…

I would like to dispel any concerns that we are not looking at this with a sense of urgency. We are. I fought hard around budget time, as did the Ministers of State, Deputies Calleary and Richmond, to make sure we could get as much money as possible for the ICOB scheme. I do not think any Opposition parties called for a fund to help compensate businesses for increased pressures in costs. We put a fund of €250 million in place and increased it by €7 million in order to increase thresholds, etc., to get 143,000 busin…