Select Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment debate -
Thursday, 17 Oct 2024

I thank members and witnesses for participating in today's meeting. Anyone joining remotely needs to do so from within the Leinster House complex, as they know. We will now proceed with our consideration of the 2024 Supplementary Estimate for Vote 32. To discuss the matter today, I welcome the Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment with special responsibility for business, employment and retail, Deputy Emer Higgins, who is accompanied by her officials. I express my sympathy and the sympathy of everybody else with the Minister, Deputy Burke, on the sad loss of his mother, which was a shock to him and everybody, last week.

Before we start, I wish to explain some limitations to parliamentary privilege and the practices of the Houses as regards references witnesses may make to other persons in their evidence. They are protected by absolute privilege in respect of the presentation they make to the committee. This means they have an absolute defence against any defamation action for anything they say at the meeting. However, they are expected not to abuse this privilege. It is my duty as Chair to ensure the privilege is not abused. If their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, I will direct them to discontinue their remarks and it is imperative that they comply with any such direction. I invite the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins, to make her opening statement on the Supplementary Estimates. As normal, documentation for the meeting has been circulated on MS Teams.

I thank the committee for the opportunity to present our Department’s Supplementary Estimate to the members of the select committee this evening. As the Cathaoirleach did, I would like to use this opportunity to express the Minister's apologies for not being able to attend the committee today due to a family bereavement and to let him know his is in our thoughts and prayers. I know members of the committee will join me in expressing sympathy him and his family at this really difficult time.

I understand my officials provided the secretariat with details of the various elements of the Supplementary Estimate, which hopefully is of assistance to committee members. The Supplementary Estimate which I have the pleasure to present to the committee is substantive in its nature and seeks to increase the gross funding for our Department in 2024 by €202.246 million to €1.472 billion. The additional gross funding is offset by current and capital savings across a number of budget lines to the tune of €37.124 million and by increased appropriations-in-aid of €12 million. This essentially means that the net increase sought today in the Supplementary Estimate is €155.122 million.

The Supplementary Estimate is made up of a number of different elements. The increases sought in respect of a number of programmes relate to the funding required to meet the cost of the June and October pay increases under the public service sector pay agreement. While the Revised Estimate 2024 made provision for the January pay increase under the agreement, it did not include provision for either the subsequent June or October increases. Accordingly, additional funding to meet the cost of these increases is required across a number of programmes, including the Department’s administration pay budget, agency legacy pensions, the National Standards Authority of Ireland, the Intellectual Property Office of Ireland, the Health and Safety Authority, the Personal Injuries Resolution Board and the Low Pay Commission.

Aside from the pay increases, additional funding of €757,000 is sought to allow InterTradeIreland, ITI, to roll out a number of pilot projects under the new shared island enterprise scheme developed by InterTradeIreland, Invest Northern Ireland and Enterprise Ireland, which the committee may recall was part of the Government’s shared island priorities announced earlier this year. Specifically, ITI will use the additional funding allocation to support projects and research in the area of female entrepreneurship and collaborative cross-Border green investment projects. Promoting female entrepreneurship is a key source of job creation and innovation and a necessary step in addressing income inequality and social exclusion. It is fitting we are talking about it today on National Women's Enterprise Day. In that regard, a cohesive, cross-Border approach is the most beneficial and impactful way to help to address the barriers female entrepreneurs face across the island. In relation to cross-Border clustering, InterTradeIreland has developed a support system called Synergy aimed at improving and strengthening cross-Border and all-island cluster and network connections, cluster manager skills.

The Supplementary Estimate also provides for an additional €7.9 million in funding to meet the cost of claims under the original credit guarantee scheme, as well as the Covid credit guarantee scheme and the Ukraine credit guarantee scheme. The credit guarantee scheme programme was designed to support the provision of finance to businesses by providing lenders with an 80% State guarantee on finance provided to eligible businesses. While default rates under these various guarantee schemes remain relatively low, they have been increasing. The additional €7.9 million is required to meet the cost of increasing claims against the various guarantee schemes this year. The value of the State guaranteed loan schemes funded through the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment Vote in encouraging lending to small businesses is evidenced by the fact that almost 10,000 loans were drawn under the Covid credit guarantee scheme by the time the scheme ended in June 2022. Those loans were to the value of €708.5 million, which helped maintain 81,866 jobs during that uncertain period. In terms of the Ukraine credit guarantee scheme, at the end of August, a total of 3,731 loans were drawn to the value of €329.1 million, which is helping to maintain 109,518 jobs.

The Supplementary Estimate seeks €7.202 million in funding for the Department’s humanitarian relief programme. As the committee will be aware, the relief programme is an emergency humanitarian contribution to help businesses affected by emergency events that have not been able to secure insurance against those events. The scheme helps towards the costs of returning business premises and community, voluntary and sporting bodies to their pre-emergency-event condition. This relates in particular to flooding and can include the replacement of flooring, fixtures, fittings and damaged stock. Some of the funding sought is required to meet the costs of claims from eligible businesses, community, voluntary and sporting groups which suffered damage arising from severe weather conditions as a result of significant storms in the latter half of 2023. The committee will recall that in the light of the severity of those events, the Government agreed to provide enhanced discrete support beyond the standard terms of the normal ad hoc schemes to eligible businesses affected by the events in question. The detailed verifications in respect of a number of claims under the 2023 ad hoc scheme were not completed by year-end last year and a number were carried over into 2024. The funding sought in the Estimate is to meet the cost of paying those claims. It is estimated that the payments made in 2023 and this year will have provided almost €10 million in humanitarian assistance to businesses affected by last winter’s storms.

The funding being provided in the Supplementary Estimate is also required to meet the cost of claims expected for the more recent flooding in Bantry in respect of which a further ad hoc humanitarian relief scheme has now been established.

Additional funding of €170 million is being sought in the Supplementary Estimate to meet the cost of payments under the power up scheme, which was announced in the budget. Members may be aware that it is intended to provide a direct financial boost to SMEs in the hospitality and retail sectors. The scheme will provide further grants to eligible retail and hospitality businesses of €4,000 by the end of this year. It will be administered by local authorities and I thank them for their collaboration on that.

The details of the schemes are currently being finalised. As is the case for the increased cost of business, ICOB, scheme, applications for the power up grant scheme will be managed, as I said, by the local authorities. It is expected the local authorities will be open for applications in the coming weeks. It is intended that all grant payments under the scheme will be made before the end of this year. That is our absolute intention. The power up grant follows on from the increased cost of business scheme which, over the past six months, has paid out more than €242 million to almost 75,000 SMEs nationwide. My Department, through the ICOB and power up schemes, will provide more than €410 million in financial support to the retail and hospitality sectors this year.

Notwithstanding this significant level of support, the Government is conscious of the challenges faced by SMEs and small businesses in the current economic climate. As well as providing for the power up scheme, budget 2025 introduced a number of targeted taxation measures to assist small businesses, including the increase in the VAT registration thresholds; an increase in the payment threshold for the research and development, tax credit; the extension of the incentive for employment investment, the start-up relief for entrepreneurs and the start-up capital incentive for a further two years to the end of 2026; as well as changes to retirement relief to facilitate the intergenerational transfer of Irish family businesses.

The committee will be aware of the SME focused package of measures announced by the Minister, Deputy Peter Burke, last May. Many of these measures have already been implemented, including the extension of the ICOB scheme; the payment of a second ICOB grant to businesses in the retail and hospitality sector; the doubling of the innovation grant scheme to €10,000; the increase of the energy efficiency grant scheme to €10,000; the reduction in the business contribution rate from 50% to 25%; the increase of the lending limit for Microfinance Ireland loans to €50,000 from €25,000; the launch of the new online national enterprise hub for SMEs to access information on the wide range of Government business supports; and other targeted measures. The package also included commitments to minimise the regulatory burden on SMEs. Specifically, the Government is committed to rigorously applying a new SME test across Departments and public and regulatory bodies. The new test will oblige policymakers to consider the impact that any new policy, legislation or regulation may have on SMEs and to mitigate against those impacts where appropriate. The SME test also acts as a reminder to policymakers to think small first.

Funding of €7 million is also being sought in the Supplementary Estimate to support the Department’s science and technology development programme. The funding is required to allow Enterprise Ireland to launch a capital equipment call to support its existing technology gateways and technology centres to improve their capabilities by investing at a scale that allows them to bridge the gap between their existing capabilities and the state-of-the-art technologies. Having access to state-of-the-art equipment will enhance the ability of the centres to function as an engine for economic development, thereby helping more companies to engage in research and development, to develop new products, services and manufacturing process technologies and increasing collaboration between academia and industry. Over the past five years Enterprise Ireland has run five separate calls to fund capital equipment in its technology gateways and technology centres. The scale of the funding for individual items has been in the region of €50,000 to €400,000, with a number of larger items being funded on an exceptional basis. In total €44.2 million was approved, funding 205 items over the past five years. The equipment funded by these calls has helped to leverage more than 5,000 projects between industry and the third level sector via the technology gateways and centres. The industry contribution towards the projects that have utilised the equipment has been more than €30million. This has also led to a significant increase in the number of disruptive technologies innovation fund, innovation partnership and horizon Europe applications made through the gateways and centres.

Additional funding of €5.3 million is being sought in the Supplementary Estimate to support the operations of the digital services co-ordinator, DSC. The DSC is a constituent part of Coimisiún na Meán. A provision of €6.009 million was originally included in the 2024 Revised Estimates to support the operations of the DSC. The 2024 funding estimate for the DSC was compiled in the autumn of last year, which was in advance of the DSC assuming its full responsibilities under the Digital Services Act in February 2024 and also in advance of the appointment of the Digital Services Commissioner in July. The reality is that given the scope of the DSC’s mandate and the presence of 15 of the 25 largest platforms in this country, Ireland has an important role to play in the enforcement and regulation of the Digital Service Act system of regulation across Europe. It is therefore essential that it has the necessary resources to carry out this role. The additional funding of €5.3 million being sought for the DSC in the Supplementary Estimate will allow that to happen.

Since its establishment, the DSC has established a dedicated contact centre for complaints and advice and is running a number of engagement and communication campaigns, such as the Spot it, Flag it, Stop it information campaign about combating illegal content online, based on the provisions of the Digital Service Act. The DSC has represented Ireland on the European Board for Digital Services; acted as lead member of the digital regulators group; established strong co-operation with national bodies including An Garda Síochána, the Electoral Commission, the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, CCPC; collaborated with the European Commission in enforcement of very large online platforms and search engines; completed a focused review of online platforms’ compliance with Articles 12 and 16 of the EU Digital Services Act; and built its online safety framework with projects to set out its investigation procedures and process for certification of trusted flaggers and out-of-court dispute settlement bodies. The Digital Services (Levy) Act 2024, which was commenced in September 2024, will permit the DSC to impose a levy on regulated businesses and work is ongoing to ensure that the DSC will be self-funded from January next year.

As previously mentioned, the Department is seeking to redistribute €37.124 million in savings to fund its priorities this year. Savings on a number of programmes, including at the Workplace Relations Commission, the Corporate Enforcement Authority, the CCPC and the local employment offices, LEOs, are in the main due to difficulties in recruiting staff in the current tight labour market. Notwithstanding this, active recruitment campaigns are being undertaken by the agencies concerned and they have resulted in a measure of success, but they continue to suffer from levels of staff churn. Modest savings are expected at the IDA mainly as a result of uncertainties in a number of property transactions. The Supplementary Estimate is also being funded by expected savings of €12.3 million on Enterprise Ireland’s enterprise development allocation. This is due to slowness in the drawdown of a number of its schemes and programmes. The saving on subscriptions to international organisations in subhead A11 relates to a pension provision of €1.6 million included in the 2024 cost of Ireland’s membership of the World Trade Organization, which will not be required this year. The modest saving of €1 million on the ICOB scheme represents 0.4% of its overall allocation. Expenditure of €32.5 million is expected under the disruptive technology innovation fund in 2024. This saving of €10 million on the Revised Estimate allocation of €42.5 million is due to a number of factors, including the failure of a number of projects to commence due to the lead partners’ inability to raise matching funding, delays in the signing of contracts, for example due to issues such as company acquisition or change in partnerships, and a number of small companies being unable to receive advance payment due to inability to cover contingent grant liability. The additional gross funding sought in the Supplementary Estimate is also being reduced by the increase of €12 million in appropriations-in-aid the Department expects to receive this year. This increase is essentially due to the growth in applications for employment permits and the attendant fees related to these applications. The increase in demand for permits is principally driven by increased economic activity in the State, our tight labour market and the recent expansion of the occupations list, which means there are additional roles for which an employment permit can now issue.

I hope the foregoing has provided the committee with all the details it needs on the various elements of the Supplementary Estimate and I will answer any questions members have.

I wish to add my own voice of sympathy to the Minister, Deputy Burke, who is not here. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins, for being here albeit under sad circumstances.

I have a number of questions. I have not brought the Estimate with me but I should be able to do it from my notes. If I get a bit lost, bear with me. Regarding the funding under jobs and enterprise development, is the power up grant being provided out of this allocation? On that, and as the man says, while I have the Minister of State, are businesses currently engaged in a rates re-evaluation process but are tax compliant, excluded or included? It is fine if there is a note or something to come after it. I am happy to receive that either.

Yes, the Estimate includes the power up grant. This grant is being provided by the jobs and enterprise programme. The finer details of it are being worked out at the moment. The ambition is that we will have €4,000 straight into the accounts of SMEs in the retail and hospitality sector over the next couple of months between now and the end of this year. That is subject to the same terms and conditions of the ICOB grant so that their rates bill is under €30,000. We are looking at making sure it is not just those who are eligible for that ICOB round 2, if you like. We are also looking at people who are rateable this year but who were not rateable last year. That is the change that has come into play to make sure we are capturing new entrants to the market that last year may not have been paying rates but that are paying rates this year.

I thank the Minister of State for that response. It is not just me but others, namely, business representative groups, have classed the ICOB grant as falling far short. They use the word "failure". They say this grant scheme will be another failure if it mirrors exactly the other model. In the discussions regarding this measure, was consideration given to making a significant contribution towards the wages of employes through either a PRSI rebate or a similar scheme? As the Minister of State knows, this is something my party favoured following engagement with IBEC, ISME and other representative groups. Was consideration given to that or did it come up in the course of the discussions between the Department and the business representatives?

PRSI is a matter for the Department of Social Protection but having said that, this is something which we are working closely with the Department on. Earlier this year, my Department, in collaboration with the Department of Social Protection, produced a report on the increased cost of doing business and PRSI was one of the things that was flagged in that. It is something on which there is ongoing engagement. Regarding ICOB, pretty much its full allocation is invested. Some €7 million was drawn down, albeit a very small non-drawdown on it, plus we have now another €170 million which we are investing into those businesses to support them. That is all investment that has happened this year alone. ICOB and the power up grant will provide in total over €410 million to SMEs this year alone. That is quite a substantial investment.

Can I ask about the funding decreases for the jobs and enterprise development programme and the enterprise, innovation and commercialisation programme? My notes show decreases of 26% and 4%, respectively. Will the Minister of State account for these decreases? I know some of them will be because there is no ICOB scheme in the budget. Beyond that, is there a different or another reason for those decreases?

They are savings for Enterprise Ireland and IDA. The Enterprise Ireland savings relate to two programmes, namely, the capital investment scheme for agriculture, which is something on which we work in collaboration with the Department of agriculture and the other one is the smart regions funding. I assure everybody we fully intend to fully draw down the EU ERDF funding for that scheme. We will spend less this year than we had anticipated but that will go into next year's budget. We fully intend to bring that down. On this, the reason we will not fully draw it down this year was because there was a delay in launching the scheme. It was only launched in October this year and we had envisaged it being launched earlier this year. Since it has been launched in October, we expect to spend €5 million in the smart regions fund under that. Anything that is not used in that we expect to draw down-----

There is an estimated 39% increase in spending on policy reviews, consultancy services and research. That seems like a fairly hefty increase. Will the Minister of State give us a flavour of what kind of work will be funded and why that work cannot be done in-house? She is here with her officials, all very capable, competent people, as we know. Why can that work not be done in-house? What is the nature of the spending?

On that, we have had hearings on AI and you would nearly terrify yourself. I understand AI moves very fast, etc. Is there work under way in the Department to skill people up? This is not an area I suspect will be a flash in the pan. I do not think this is a passing fad. I suspect this is something for the future.

I agree with the Deputy. It is certainly not going to be a flash in the pan. This is something we have to prepare for, both as a Department and a Government and also as an economy and a society. We have a dedicated unit within Enterprise Ireland that is doing exactly that. It is providing upskilling and investing in it for that exact reason.

My final question relates to the disruptive technologies and innovation fund. I understand from the Minister of State's contribution that there are a number of reasons why almost a quarter of that money was not used. Is there a concern there? I can see the reasons why but given that it is a fund that should be oversubscribed, is there any concern? Has the Department undertaken any specific work to understand why that money has not been utilised?

Is there any concern at departmental level?

Call number seven on this was announced as a rolling call. That means applications can come in at any stage up until the closing date of April of next year. We did that for the reason of developing a pipeline of applications that would allow companies more time to meet with possible partners to explore the potential for submitting projects. There is a lot of work involved in this from applicants' perspective and we do not want to put them under pressure to hit a specific deadline. That is why we have it as a rolling deadline. To the Deputy's point, to make sure that we draw it down, my Department has asked Enterprise Ireland to exploit its company databases and sector experts, and to engage with other enterprise agencies and research bodies to identify potential companies and research institutions that could form a pipeline of future applications. Development advisers and Enterprise Ireland are now encouraged to engage directly with clients for that reason. My Department is also conducting a stakeholder consultation exercise to obtain perspectives and recommendations to see whether we need to in any way make adjustments to that application process.

It is €42 million for the year. Quite a lot of that, €32 million, has already been used. It is primarily around contracts. Approximately 50% of this fund so far has been used for life sciences and healthcare projects. For the rest, we are prioritising, for example, AI and engineering. Many of these projects are already happening throughout the country. I visited one in UCD just a week or two ago, where fantastic work is going on in the space sector and with Debra Ireland. On top of that, regarding the overall award of €371 million in funding, 104 calls for the disruptive technologies innovation fund have already come in under the first six calls. We are on the seventh rolling call but we have already administered €371 million to date from the first six.

I welcome the Minister of State and her officials. I, too, associate myself with the condolences to the Minister, Deputy Peter Burke, on the recent passing of his mum, which is not easy.

Looking through what we have been presented with, I am struck by the huge amount of work by officials going on in the Department. A huge amount of positive stuff is going on and businesses are being supported. Some businesses were disappointed, in the hospitality sector in particular. We had a discussion on these businesses being under pressure previously. The Minister of State might be able to tell us and point out how they are being supported through the Estimates.

I am very taken with the shared island enterprise scheme. I note it is National Women's Enterprise Day, as the Minister of State said. In my previous role as Minister of State with responsibility for equality, I did a lot of work in that space, including with the Balance for Better Business strategy, which I understand the Department is supporting in a big way and is going very well. I am also interested in the green cross-Border investment project, which includes huge initiatives. The Minister of State might tell us a little about that.

An additional €7.9 million for the various guarantee schemes is being looked for. A lot of money has been paid out in that regard, but does that indicate a defaulting on the loans that were given? How many are there? Will the Minister of State say a bit about that?

I will talk about the humanitarian relief programme. I come from Midleton, which was probably most impacted in a dreadful way by Storm Babet, almost a year ago now. Tomorrow is the anniversary. I put on the record my thanks to the Department and officials who supported businesses and community groups in the town where I live to a huge extent. I am not sure whether people realise how devastating it is to have everything you own and all of your business wiped out completely. Red Cross officials came and dealt with people in a very positive, supportive and humanitarian way. This scheme meant so much to people. I was asked a question today; I think I know the answer but I will put it out there anyway. A constituent called me this afternoon who wanted to know whether the grant money was taxable. My answer to her was "No", as it is grant funding, but I want to be clear on that. I ask for an answer from the Minister of State on that.

I will make two suggestions. It is to be hoped we will not see the need for this again but, with climate change and so on, it will probably happen. Some businesses were insured but not to the amount they needed in the event of what happened with Storm Babet. They were insured to cover normal flooding events but that event was extraordinary. As they were not refused insurance, they did not qualify under the Red Cross scheme. They did the right thing. They applied for and got insurance. They were insured to a certain limit but when they applied for the humanitarian relief, they were denied it, even though they had incurred huge losses in some instances. I accept that was the way the scheme was designed. Those businesses know that. It could be said that if they had paid a higher premium and got more insurance, they would be fully covered. In the normal course of events they were covered, but this was an extraordinary event. That might be taken into account in future. In the event that someone was not refused insurance but had taken on what might be called a reasonable amount and quality of insurance, their losses might also be taken into account. The person next door, who was unable to get insurance, got compensated by up to €100,000, which was extraordinarily generous and supportive and was administered in a very positive way. That was one little glitch in the system that could be looked at in future.

The other issue is that it was decided that premises had to be rateable in order to qualify. I came across one or two cases where people had, unfortunately, temporarily moved merchandise to a premises that was not rateable. That premises was flooded and they lost everything. They could not be covered by the scheme either. Those are two glitches that we could not resolve because the scheme was designed in that way. Those kind of anomalies that crop up might be taken into account in future, where people are caught through no fault of their own. Otherwise, the scheme was very well administered and designed. The money was paid out very quickly, which saved businesses from going under. The Red Cross personnel operated in a very friendly, humanitarian and professional way. I want to put that on the record. The town where I live was absolutely devastated with water 3 ft or 4 ft high or more inside premises. It all happened within 20 minutes. It was so fast it was just unbelievable. It was so bad it was biblical.

Will the Minister of State tell us how the power up scheme will work? I like the idea of the SME test. Are there examples of where technology gateways and technology centres are at, including the location and what they are? The digital services commissioner was mentioned.

Employment permits are the final thing I will talk about. I note there is an expectation of an increase in funding there. What is happening to the commitment given to link an employment permit with a visa so there is a single application procedure? That whole system is still very cumbersome, even though the Department has made a lot of advancement on that. Will the Minister of State tell me how the intra-company transfer partner or spouse work permit system, which is an old issue I was on about for a long time that finally got over the line this year, is working? That is something we wanted to get done. The Minister, Deputy McEntee, made a decision that spouses and partners of people on intra-company transfers could work straight away and automatically. However, there seem to be issues with visas. What kind of permit do they have to get and where do they get it? I do not see it explicitly mentioned on the Department's website. Maybe I missed it. I looked for it because I wanted to see a clear explanation of that permit. I do not see it, but it might be there and I missed it.

I thank the Deputy, especially for his positive remarks on the assistance that the Government and the Department provided to his constituents in Midleton, and to SMEs throughout the country, this year.

I thank him for his leadership and vision on the shared island enterprise scheme. It is working very well. I am very glad we are seeking additional funding for it. It is very interesting that a huge proportion of that additional funding is to help fund female entrepreneurs, which is very positive.

As I said, today is National Women's Enterprise Day. I was at an event in Fingal earlier this morning. It was fantastic to meet so many inspirational female entrepreneurs and businesspeople who are doing incredible work around the country and are also powering the economy, because many of them are creating jobs.

Regarding the credit guarantee scheme, we can go back to the deferral rate but to date, the annual rate of claims on defaulted loans has been running at approximately 2% of the drawdown under the scheme, so loans must be in default for 90 days before a lender can submit a claim for a payment under the guarantee. This time period provides a window in which a defaulted loan may come back into payment and not result in a claim. The low level of claims shows that businesses up to this point have been able to meet their repayment obligations but there is always a possibility that claim levels could increase from their current level in the coming years. We are, however, on a good trajectory.

Regarding the humanitarian flood programme, €10 million will have been provided to businesses in County Cork, between Midleton and Bantry, by the end of this year. We are happy to have done this and to be in a position to be able to provide that support to businesses we know so desperately need it. I thank the Irish Red Cross for administering the scheme so well.

The Deputy spoke about two specific issues. He referred to them as anomalies within the scheme, relating to those who were insured but were not able to claim the full cost of the damage done, and those who were operating on a temporary basis from an unrateable business. The temporary basis from an unrateable business might be difficult for us to account for but we can definitely look at that and see how it would work. Ultimately, this scheme was designed not just for those who did not have insurance but for those who could not get insurance and were deemed uninsurable. The Deputy is right that there is a cohort who are probably at a disadvantage, having paid insurance, so that is something we can look at. I am happy to take any suggestions he may have on this by email because I am conscious that we now have a second scheme in operation in Bantry.

Regarding the power-up grant, we are trying to make it as easy as possible for businesses to engage with this. ICOB 2, as we call it, the specific double payment for retailers and those working in the hospitality industry, happened really quickly, without the need for anybody to do anything. We want to get to a point of administering grants that easily. To do this one, we just have to confirm that all those companies are still in operation. Local authorities will send emails to all the businesses which received ICOB 2 in their area and ask them to tick a box to indicate they are still in operation and are up to date in their tax affairs. The money will then be administered in the same way through the local authorities, with €4,000 between now and the end of the year. I thank my officials, who have engaged with the Local Government Management Agency on this. We set a tough timeline. We wanted to make sure this money got into the accounts of businesses between now and the end of the year. We appreciate that doing that places a big administrative burden on local authorities. Our Department is paying them for that service but ultimately it was a big ask of them. I put on record my gratitude to the LGMA and the directors of finance and their teams across local authorities, who are administering that for us. As I mentioned to Deputy O'Reilly, we are also making provision for companies which were not rateable last year but which are rateable this year, with rates bills of under €30,000, to draw that down.

Regarding the visas and the intra-company spousal arrangements, I thank the Deputy for all the work he has done on this. I know he has done an awful lot. This has been in operation since May. It is a little too early to tell the Deputy definitively how we think it is going but we are monitoring it. We agreed to begin the roll-out of a single permit to both work and live in Ireland. The intra-company spousal permit is in operation. We are monitoring it. We cannot necessarily say to the Deputy at this stage whether it is working as designed because it is really in its infancy at this point.

On the Deputy's other economic immigration question, in May, the Government agreed to begin the roll-out of a single permit to both work and live in Ireland. At the moment, people have to apply to my Department for a work permit and then go to the Department of Justice to apply for a visa. I know this is creating many delays and frustration on the part of applicants and businesses. It is also costing time. By introducing a single permission, we can reduce the costs and complexity for both employers and the applicants of having to separately obtain employment and residency visas. We began to roll that out in May.

I have a question for the Minister of State on the savings on the programmes she referenced earlier, including the Workplace Relations Commission, Corporate Enforcement Authority, Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, CCPC, and local enterprise offices. She suggested the savings were because they could not recruit the staff. Does she have the numbers of outstanding staff for each of those four organisations? If she does not have them with her, she might send them on.

I can go through that. The Health and Safety Authority, HSA, now has 317 sanctioned posts. That is an increase from 190 in December 2020. There are currently 280 staff in situ. The overall vacancy rate is impacted by retirements and resignations, in addition to those recruitment challenges the Chair mentioned. The HSA anticipates an additional 27 new starters next year, which will bring staffing levels to 317 at the end of next year. Inspector vacancies are being prioritised. The anticipated 27 new starters will be primarily inspector grades in specialist roles. The majority of the HSA inspectors are at grade 3 level. The cost of employing ten additional inspectors at grade 3, including employer PRSI, recruitment and onboarding costs, is approximately €568,000 for the next year.

The Workplace Relations Commission has a sanctioned staff complement of 225 civil servants, who are staff of my Department. The WRC inspectorate currently has sanction for 80 inspectors, including ten inspectors who were added as part of this budget. It currently has 55 inspectors in situ. A national recruitment competition has just recently closed. It is expected that the 15 current inspector vacancies and the ten new inspector posts will be filled on foot of those competitions. We have very good panels. We got 230 applications. We are happy with how that recruitment has gone. We have two different panels and we expect to hit those figures by the end of this year, with 15 new hires and ten more at the start of next year.

The CCPC's sanctioned headcount is 263. At the beginning of October, the serving sanctioned number of staff was 218. The CCPC plans to fill all current vacant posts this year. There are currently 45. The CCPC has informed my officials that it is making significant progress in recruitment efforts. Twenty-six of these vacancies are already in the recruitment process and we expect to have new hires shortly.

The savings there arise due to the timing of the backfilling positions that follow transfers out, internal promotions from people who are acting up, and through filing recently sanctioned posts. The authority currently has 14 civilian vacancies. We are recruiting for the 14 vacancies. As I said, those vacancies arise out of internal promotions and transfers. They are positives.

As an aside, and maybe I am stretching it a bit raising it with the Estimates, there is going to be huge potential in the development of offshore wind. A lot of jobs will be created in that sector. A lot of new skills will be required and there will need to be a lot upskilling. A lot of the landing jobs will be onshore but many will be on ships. What strategies are being put in place to ensure those jobs on ships will be of benefit to Ireland and Irish workers and that they will not be for people from other countries, in other words, that they will not be Irish-controlled ships? That whole sector is moving and developing quickly and I am not sure the Department is focused on it yet. With regard to the offshore work and ships, we need to build them. The expansion in offshore renewable energy will lead to a global shortage of these vessels. It is going to be a big challenge. There are bottlenecks in this industry that we need to be prepared for. I thought I would flag that issue.

As for my own area and Cork Harbour, the Port of Cork recently got serious funding to expand its enterprise there to develop offshore wind. We went to Belfast to look at what is being done up there. It is way ahead. There is also some ideal land at the back of the Port of Cork, which could be very useful for this industry. I raised this previously and we learned about that when we visited Cork. The Department could have look at it and talk to the IDA about leasing it or making it available to the port to take some pressure off and allow us to get a step ahead. We have the maritime areas off the coast that have been put in place but we need to have a place to assemble the turbines and all the infrastructure that goes with that. There are a lot of high-tech jobs in this sector and because it is offshore, it should not be as problematic as the onshore wind farms, which have become toxic.

In my area, we have solar farms sprouting up, with hundreds of acres of solar farms in one spot and thousands of acres being earmarked. There is fair kickback against that. People do not like to see it when they are looking out. The Tánaiste, in the Dáil today, said that instead of looking at 40 shades of green, people will be looking at 40 shades of grey. It will be a big change if that happens, so it is something for the Department to keep an eye on.

I thank the Deputy. I fully agree with him. This area offers huge opportunities from a renewability and renewable energy perspective but also from an employment perspective. The Deputy referenced the maritime areas and the Maritime Area Planning Act that came into force in the last number of years. Having been a member of the joint committee on housing and planning, that was something I was very involved in. There is huge potential to create jobs in key areas like Cork, the Shannon Estuary and along the east coast. It gives us an opportunity to develop new jobs and skills outside of Ireland in a way that provides us with the ability to invest and recoup energy from renewable sources.

We have in the Department an expert group on future skills needs which is finalising its work plan for 2025. Offshore wind is a key area it is specifically looking at. We also have a feasibility study under way for the offshore wind energy centre, and we expect to have it completed next year. This is a huge priority area for the Government, the Department of energy and climate and also our Department from an employment perspective. The Deputy raised some good ideas with regard to his constituency, which he knows very well. I would welcome the opportunity to discuss this issue further with him.

I was getting worried there for a minute.

I thank the Minister of State. I propose that the consideration of Supplementary Estimates by the committee has concluded. Is that agreed? Agreed. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins, for assisting the committee in its consideration of the Supplementary Estimates.