Government plan aims for 100,000 new jobs by 2016

A Government plan designed to promote the creation of 100,000 jobs over the next four years has been published today.

The Action Plan for Jobs 2012 seeks to help companies expand their scope for exporting goods; provide credit to small and medium sized enterprises; improve competitiveness; and attract more international investment to Ireland.

The plan contains over 270 actions that the Government said would be implemented this year across 15 departments and 36 State agencies. A number of the initiatives are connected to measures introduced in Budget 2012, when the banking sector was restructured last March or announced at the Global Irish Economic Forum last year.

The Government would be publishing quarterly reports of progress on its jobs plan, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said today.

Acknowledging that not everything in the plan was new, Mr Kenny said: “There are some things in here that have been lying around for a very long time.

“I make no apology, because these are good ideas that were not implemented: there is no reason why this Government should not implement them.”

The Government was creating the atmosphere and environment where “100,000 net new jobs” could be created by 2016.

However, small firms group Isme said the plan was a disappointment. "Once more this Government have flattered to deceive, with very little that is new or innovative and certainly will have minimal effect on immediate job creation, being long on aspiration and tragically short on real dynamic action," it said.

Under the initiative, county and city enterprise boards are to be dissolved and instead amalgamated into a “one stop shop” entity that will be operated by Enterprise Ireland and tasked with providing advice to the local authorities.

Other measures include:

- A €150 million Development Capital Scheme which will offer supports for small and medium-sized businesses with the potential to create jobs that are struggling to access credit

- Members of the Irish diaspora are to be offered a “finder’s fee” to attract inward investors to Ireland

- A request to Government Department and Agencies to identify, by next month, charges levied on business that can be frozen or reduced for 24 months

- An examination of what structures and policies could be developed to make Ireland a world centre for managing and trading in intellectual property

- The extension of the corporation tax exemption for start-up companies until 2014

- A Micro Finance fund to generate up to €100 million in extra lending for micro‐businesses over a period of 10 years

The plan also includes a selection of "Bold Ambitions" including making Ireland "the best small country" in which to do business; earning a top‐five ranking in international competitiveness; and to get the number of people at work in the Irish economy back to two million.

Speaking at the unveiling of the plan, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation Richard Bruton said the initiative was an “ambitious programme of reform across government and the economy to improve supports for business and remove barriers to job-creation in Ireland.

“We will improve access to finance for small businesses, reduce costs and red tape, and improve supports for exports, management and innovation,” he said. “It will not be easy, but we are determined to implement the plan, rebuild the economy and create the jobs we so badly need”.

Asked if there would be a change of emphasis from export-oriented companies, Mr Bruton said exports were “going to be vital”, but he added: “Equally we recognise that many of the small businesses that will create employment in the near future will be reliant initially on the domestic market.”

Questioned on the “finder’s fee” to be paid to individuals who bring job projects to Ireland, Mr Bruton said: “We have appointed an operator to be the operator of this scheme, who will effectively run the administration so that people who wish to introduce a potential new investor will contact the operator.

“Clearly this project has to be sustainable: the employment project has to be one that is sustained over a considerable period.”

It was “essentially aimed at smaller businesses” and where the project was a sustained one “the operator would get up to €4,000 per job, clearly the lion’s share going to those who introduced the project”.

This was a way of “reaching out beyond the IDA” he said, adding: “This is an opportunity to reach out to Irish people with contacts across the globe.”

On the issue of keeping Ireland’s 12.5 per cent rate of corporation tax as an incentive to foreign investors, Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore said: “The Government have made it very, very clear that we will not be changing the rate of corporation tax.”

He recalled that last year there was "an attempt to arm-twist" the Government into raising the rate of corporation tax: "We successfully resisted that."

The Taoiseach said the plan was the third strand of the Government’s economic initiative having already moved to rebuild the banking sector last March and to stabilise the public finances with December’s budget.

Mr Kenny said no government could directly create jobs in the current economic circumstances but that “good government removes the barriers to job creation by entrepreneurs and industry”.

“That’s why in Budget 2012, we didn’t increase taxes on work. That’s why we will always push for the kinds of change that make it worthwhile to go to work,” he said. “That’s why we will do all we can to encourage people into, or back into, the workforce as new opportunities arrive.”

A monitoring committee involving officials from the Department of the Taoiseach, Department of Jobs, Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and Forfás will be established to police the implementation of the measures outlined.

The Cabinet has approved the initiative as well as the secondment of a small number of staff from Forfás to the Department of the Taoiseach to provide expertise.

Fianna Fáil said the plan displayed a “significant lack of imagination” on the Government’s part and was more focused on organisational changes than stimulus measures.

The party’s spokesman on jobs and enterprise, Willie O’Dea, said “the Government’s document simply draws every measure that has been announced over the past few years, including by the last administration, into one document”.