SaveJobs campaign 'given impetus' by appointment of Simon Harris

Elections this year sharpen focus of campaign of small firms over escalating costs

Neil McDonnell, chief executive at Isme, said the likely election of Simon Harris (pictured) as taoiseach in the coming days and the looming local, European, and likely general election this year, has given impetus to the SaveJobs group set up to campaign against what it sees as a range of costs and administrative burdens that have been imposed on small firms without their consultation.

The appointment of Simon Harris as Fine Gael leader and looming elections this year will sharpen the focus of SaveJobs.ie, an alliance of business groups for small businesses that is lobbying politicians about escalating costs facing small firms, according to a leading member of the campaign. 

Neil McDonnell, chief executive at Isme, said the likely election of Mr Harris as taoiseach in the coming days and the looming local, European, and likely general election this year, has given impetus to the SaveJobs group set up to campaign against what it sees as a range of costs and administrative burdens that have been imposed on small firms without their consultation.

The SavesJob campaign includes Isme, as well as pubs group Vintners' Federation Ireland, the Restaurants Association of Ireland, Nursing Homes Ireland, retail groups Retail Excellence and RGDATA, two hairdresser business groups, the convenience stores and newsagents group (CSNA), as well as craft butchers.  

Mr McDonnell said that SaveJobs plans to get politicians talking about the needs of small firms ahead of the three elections. He said that talk of an early budget and a general election later this year had sharpened the focus of the campaign group, as it plans to get the concerns of small businesses on manifesto pledges of the political parties. 

"This is not a case of complaining, or of whining," Mr McDonnell said, but that businesses face "a radically changed cost base", he said, citing increased costs for hospitality firms and also a range of costs and administrative demands by public agencies made on all other small firms. 

The group is based along the lines of the successful Alliance for Insurance Reform that lobbied Government for a shake-up in public liability insurance costs and court awards against small firms. 

Mr McDonnell praised the significant role long-played by the Government's Enterprise Ireland agency in funding for Irish small firms. However, Government policy could be even more ambitious by helping tap more sources for private capital, he said. 

'Unfair and unsustainable'

SaveJobs is attempting to secure a bigger voice in government for small businesses. 

Mr McDonnell said that the Big Tech and other multinationals in Ireland are significant employers in their own right and their voice was heard by Government parties, but that small firms which also employ many hundreds of thousands of people feel ignored. 

According to the SaveJobs campaign website: "The forum in which matters such as pay and collective bargaining is discussed in Ireland, LEEF (Labour Employer Economic Forum), excludes representatives of small business, even though they employ 60% of the workforce. This is unfair and unsustainable". 

"At SaveJobs.ie, we know that small businesses are the backbone of the Irish economy. We also know that politicians prefer to deal with big businesses opening big new facilities employing lots of people," it said. 

"But those big businesses are thinly spread, while small businesses support main street in every town and village in Ireland. Savejobs.ie is composed of many representatives from many sectors in the Irish economy, services, hospitality, leisure, manufacturing, construction, entertainment and so on," the group said.