Latest news with #publicinvestment
Irish Times
4 days ago
- Business
- Irish Times
Public innovation investment ‘has not kept pace' with private sector, Ibec says
Ireland's largest business lobby group, Ibec has called on the Government to increase the amount of public investment into research and development as Ireland drops below the European average for public spend per capita. Ibec has described Ireland's national research and innovation (R&I) infrastructure as becoming 'obsolete and out of date', claiming it is limiting research and innovation capacity in the State. As part of a series of policy position papers on Ireland's competitiveness and productivity, the group called on the Government to increase public investment in R&I to 1 per cent of modified gross national income by 2035 to 'fuel the long-standing ambition of becoming a European innovation leader'. Ireland's national research and innovation strategy, Impact 2030, sets out the target for Ireland to be classified as an Innovation Leader under the European Innovation Scoreboard by 2030 by achieving a score in excess of 125 per cent of the EU average. In last year's scoreboard, Ireland's performance stood at 113.2 per cent of the EU average, against its 2021 baseline of 108 per cent. READ MORE As it stands, Ireland's public investment accounts for just 13 per cent of the €8 billion national spend on research and innovation. Ibec said, 'Simply put, public investment has not kept pace with the surge of financing provided by industry.' The Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science estimated that public investment in innovation surpassed the €1 billion mark for the first time in 2023. Despite this increase in spending, according to Ibec, the Irish State spends €199 per person on directly funding R&I compared to the EU average of €274. The group called on the Government to simplify access to innovation supports, which it said are 'underutilised by industry due to the administrative burden and challenges in navigating the system'. It said Ireland's research and development tax credit is 'too complex and time consuming to access for a lot of companies'. In addition to improving access to the credit, Ibec also suggested the credit's expansion to cover offshore related-party research. [ EU warns it could accelerate retaliatory tariffs over US duties Opens in new window ] It said this measure would 'reflect the realities of how [intellectual property] is developed across global operations' and would 'incentivise the retention of [intellectual property] in the Irish tax base'. To improve national research capability, Ibec has appealed for the creation of a new funding mechanism for higher education facilities in succession to the Programme for Research in Third Level Institutions which was launched in 1998. The group has also called for the use of the National Training Fund to attract skilled research talent, as well as investing in developing the domestic workforce by 'expanding and subsidising pathways for skills development'.
The Guardian
6 days ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Labour spending review must be ‘economic reset', Louise Haigh to say
Next month's spending review must be an 'economic reset' based on a bold wealth tax and higher public investment, the former cabinet minister Louise Haigh is to argue, as Keir Starmer faces renewed pressure from within Labour to change course. Haigh's comments come as Andy Burnham called for Labour to 're-establish itself unequivocally once again as the party of working-class ambition' with ambitious offerings on housing and education. Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, will say ministers should allow mayors to build on public land, and set a target for the point at which more new social homes are being built than existing ones are sold off. Haigh and Burnham will make their interventions in speeches at an event taking place on Saturday organised by the Labour-allied thinktank Compass. Haigh, who quit the cabinet in November after it emerged she had been convicted of fraud over a missing work phone, will reiterate her call for a wealth tax after the local election results from 1 May, which she called 'a warning' from voters that they wanted bolder policies. She will say: 'The spending review must be a moment for an economic reset. I welcome the prime minister's review of winter fuel changes but we must go further, ripping up our self-imposed tax rules and taxing the country's vast wealth.' Haigh will say the current tax system 'punishes earned income but barely touches the sides of the real driver of inequality – wealth'. It is time to 'finally move beyond a broken model where working people's wages are topped up by tax credits and benefits, leaving bad employers and landlords to profit', she will say. 'It's about moving from a system of handouts for the rich to real investment for everyone else. We need real reform: a proper wealth tax that rewards work, closes loopholes and finally gives us the means to invest in the NHS, schools and our communities.' According to extracts of his speech released in advance, Burnham will say the spending review 'will define the rest of this parliament', and he will call for Labour to focus on ways it can positively combat the electoral threat from Reform UK. Burnham will say: 'Rather than standing for the status quo, the time has come for the party to re-establish itself unequivocally once again as the party of working-class ambition, shedding the perception in the Midlands and the north of a London-centric, university-oriented party.' This would require a particular focus on housing and education, to particularly address 'the single biggest cause of Britain's modern malaise: a housing crisis caused not by immigration but by ideology'. The Thatcher-era right-to-buy policy, without investment in new social homes, 'shattered the foundations on which generations of working-class British families built better lives', Burnham will say. 'Labour's clarion call should be to free Britain from the grip of the housing crisis. In this spending review, working with mayors in the big city regions, it should set the date by which each will reach the crucial tipping point of building more social homes than they are losing. 'This is the moment when, instead of tightening its grip, the housing crisis starts to ease. To do that, the spending review should unlock public land for mayors to use to build a new generation of council homes at pace – akin to the drive of the postwar Labour government.' Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister and housing secretary, has already announced plans to restrict right to buy and has pushed for more investment in social homes, but as yet this has done little to ease the housing crisis. Other speakers at the Compass-run event will include Mark Drakeford, the former first minister of Wales, the Labour MPs Rachael Maskell and Simon Opher, and the junior energy minister, Miatta Fahnbulleh.
Bloomberg
27-05-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Stronger Growth Seen For Africa as It Weathers Tariff Shock
African economic growth will accelerate this year, thanks to public investment in agriculture and energy infrastructure seen helping shield if from the global trade war. That's according to the African Development Bank, which sees the region expanding 3.9% this year, up from 3.3% in 2024, and advancing by 4% in 2026.
Irish Times
23-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Renters forking out €2,000 per month are paying the price for water charges debacle
Abolishing domestic rates in 1978, and stopping water charges a decade ago were mistakes. And now if you can't get on the housing ladder or find yourself paying the average national rent of over €2,000 per month , you are collateral damage for these acts of fiscal stupidity and political opportunism. Paying up would have been cheap at twice the price. Nearly all public investment in housing is from central exchequer funds that rely on too narrow a tax base. Water charges could have collected money that would have been an income stream to be borrowed against off the national balance sheet. Resources could have been multiplied, investment fast-tracked, and the uncertainty of the annual budget process avoided. What was too smart by half then looks maliciously stupid now. Lack of underlying infrastructure, including water, is a key part of the housing problem. Uisce Éireann can't go to the market for money unlike ESB and Bord Gáis Energy because it was hobbled at the start. Telling local authorities to build more houses has become a kind of political sport. It is a matter of public record that we built vast estates in the 1940s and 1950s. Planning permission was not required, and local authorities raised funds through rates, and borrowed off the back of them. They could also make decisions without having to navigate the obstacle course of administrative permissions required by the central government. Reform the administrative system instantly, and what remains is local Government that cannot raise the resources required to do the job it is told it should. That is supposing local authorities wanted to take on the task, which largely they don't. Incapacity has made a comfortable career in local Government. We spend ever more on social housing , but the rents collected are inadequate to maintain the stock. Top-line investment is drained from the bottom because councillors won't raise rents to the modest levels required to maintain an expensive public investment. That deficit is an opportunity cost for the growing numbers on the waiting list. READ MORE [ Uisce Éireann warns of 'critical' need for regulatory reforms to enable housing targets Opens in new window ] As the housing shortage cuts deeper into economic competitiveness and social solidarity, the consequences of bad decisions become more apparent. In some ways, housing is more challenging than regaining international confidence after the financial crash because it is more operational with more moving parts. The decisions to cut off streams of sustainable funding for political advantage are chickens coming home to roost now. Homeowners need not worry too much – the greater the scarcity, and the longer the crisis lasts, the more homes are worth. From the point of view of wealthy homeowners, our system works. When the war on water charges was raging over a decade ago, we spent €300 million a year on water. Now it's €1.3 billion. That is big money, but the challenge is even bigger. In the Greater Dublin Area, water infrastructure developed for 500,000 people must meet the needs of a population that is three times the size and growing. We need investment of €55 billion to €60 billion up to 2050 to address known needs nationally. Nearly all of that depends on central exchequer funds. It is debatable whether water charges and borrowing off the back of them could carry that expenditure. But it is certain that all of it, on the balance sheet, is an opportunity cost that could have been substantially avoided. We are pursuing an agenda for spending more to get less. [ People thought we were fools renting in Dublin, but I'll enjoy my tiny flat while it lasts Opens in new window ] It is also more complex than that. Up to 2029, €10.2 billion is allocated to Uisce Éireann. Notionally, that services 30,000 new houses annually. But the target of 50,000 houses require another €2 billion over four years. Businesses pay water charges and rates. Households have a negligible property tax, but no water charge. That may qualify as successful politics but it sabotages those not already homeowners. Money allocated by the State over future years may be delivered on, but could also turn out to be a mirage. Funding is not what is promised, it is what is delivered in the annual budget. That highly political process is always more tactical than strategic. There is an element of uncertainty that inhibits long-term planning. Because of our planning system, more complex projects can take seven to 10 years to deliver. [ Charges for excessive water use not being considered 'at this time', department says Opens in new window ] On housing, we subverted non-exchequer national funding sources locally and nationally, and undermined delivery. Adequate supply of housing will take years longer, therefore. Politically we are so phobic that the Taoiseach insisted during his St Patrick's Day visit to the United States that 'there will be no return to water charges', quashing a story that even excess use would be charged for. The Government returned to office without a housing policy. Politically, this Government is less a Coalition than a cohabitation and lacks the internal cohesion or political will to take the risks required to exercise the authority only available at the centre to realign the administrative apparatus. Solutions abound, but on housing, the centre is now a vacant site.
Irish Times
20-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Infrastructure spending must come before tax cuts, says Ibec
Ireland's largest business lobby group, Ibec, has called on the Government to prioritise infrastructure investment over tax cuts or other expenditure. In the first in a series of policy position papers on Ireland's competitiveness and productivity, the group called on the Government to retain a consistent level of capital investment and drop barriers in the planning system for big 'common good' projects. Ireland will need to build a minimum of 500,000 homes and significantly upgrade the State's infrastructure between now and 2035 to address the country's rising population, Ibec said. 'It is critical that, in a world of growing uncertainty, we do not risk repeating the macroeconomic mistake we have made consistently over the past 50 years – deprioritising public investment when the economy slows,' said Fergal O'Brien, Ibec executive director of lobbying and influence. READ MORE Ibec called for the introduction of an explicit fiscal investment target to 'provide a fiscal anchor for the capital budget through good times and bad' as a way of guaranteeing a consistent level of public capital investment. The lobbying group said the State has cut public investment as the 'path of least resistance' when needing to introduce fiscal cutbacks. 'Consistent failure to invest in necessary infrastructure does not result in savings,' it said. 'Infrastructure deficits accrue as a form of 'technical debt'.' 'Ireland today is a living mausoleum to these past policy errors,' the policy paper said, suggesting sustained investment of €200 billion by 2035 be funded by the Exchequer, proceeds from the €13 billion Apple tax judgment, the Infrastructure, Climate and Nature Fund, and future share sales. Retaining a consistent level of capital spending would, Ibec said, reduce the need for catch-up spending when economic conditions change and lower the reliance on large-scale projects as forces of macroeconomic stabilisation. These factors would then provide more certainty to companies and young people in investing in capacity and the skills for sectors downstream from the infrastructure delivery sector. To enable the delivery of large-scale infrastructure projects, Ibec wants the Government to examine reforming the planning system, including the 'disproportionate influence of individual objectors', suggesting that constitutional change be considered. It called for a 'radical improvement' in the delivery and timelines of projects, aided by a centralised oversight structure and a prioritisation structure in the planning system. Ibec said that just 11 of the 44 big infrastructure initiatives in the pipeline in 2019 have been delivered on or before schedule. The body also called for the delivery of region-specific infrastructure to sustain local economic growth across the country. The Ibec executive director said getting infrastructure investment right could 'open the door to delivering large-scale projects that can transform our economy and society, service homes at the pace required and upgrading infrastructure to meet the standards of a modern economy and achieve our climate goals.'
