Coalition outlines plan for 100,000 jobs by 2016

The Government has unveiled measures to help create 100,000 jobs by 2016, including a “finder’s fee” for individuals who steer new positions in Ireland’s direction.

The Action Plan for Jobs contains 270 measures, ranging from new technology centres to cutting red tape, aimed at helping businesses thrive in the years ahead.

But the opposition expressed disappointment at the plan, saying it lacked “new thinking” and was “mostly a rehash of initiatives already unveiled”.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny admitted the plan contained a number of previously announced measures, but said he made “no apology” for this. Instead, he blamed the previous government for the implementation failure.

“There are some things in here that have been lying around for a very long time,” he said. “I make no apology that if these are good ideas that were not implemented, there’s no reason why this Government shouldn’t implement them.”

He promised to publish quarterly reports on the progress of the plan, with Enterprise Minister Richard Bruton saying “questions would be asked” if individual government departments or state agencies failed to implement required measures.

The plan requires actions by all 15 departments and 36 agencies.

Measures include:

* A loan guarantee scheme for small businesses, already announced but not yet up and running;

* A “one-stop shop” for small business supports. This will see county and city enterprise boards dissolved, and a dedicated small business unit established in Enterprise Ireland;

* The establishment of another new division in Enterprise Ireland to identify Irish firms with the potential to export, but which have not already done so;

* A €150m scheme aimed at filling a funding gap for mid-sized Irish companies with “significant prospects for jobs and export growth”;

* Increased mentoring of small- and medium-sized enterprises by “top business leaders, multinationals and large Irish companies”;

* A “research prioritisation plan”, which will see state funds applied to areas of research with the strongest potential for “commercialisation and job creation”;

* The reduction of costs, with departments and agencies to identify, by next month, charges levied on businesses that can be “frozen or reduced” for two years.

As part of the plan, the Government will also unveil next month a “finder’s fee” initiative entitled “Succeed in Ireland”.

People with ideas for new businesses in Ireland that could create jobs will be able to forward them to a scheme operator.

The operator will be tasked with “managing the generation of leads” and exploring whether the proposals are feasible.

Should the positions be realised and prove sustainable, a “finder’s fee” of €4,000 per job will be shared between the operator and the proposer.

The Government’s overall aim is that the Action Plan will help lift employment levels from 1.8m now to 1.9m by 2016 — meaning 100,000 new jobs.

But with over 400,000 people unemployed, there was criticism of the Government’s lack of ambition last night.

However, questions remained about the ambition of the action plan last night. The 100,000 jobs figure was the same as produced in April 2011 by a finance department projection which predicted net employment creation “in the order of 100,000… over the period 2012-2015”.

Fianna Fáil’s Willie O’Dea said the plan had “a significant lack of imagination”. Sinn Féin’s Peadar Toibín said it had “no new money and no meaningful targets”.