2026-01-13

119. Deputy Brendan Smith asked the Minister for Enterprise, Tourism and Employment if a new north-east regional enterprise plan is forthcoming; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1731/26]

Deputy Erin McGreehan is taking Question No. 119 for Deputy Brendan Smith.

I ask if a new north-east regional enterprise plan is forthcoming and if the Minister will make a statement on the matter.

Balanced regional development is a Government priority and a central component of the White Paper on Enterprise 2022-2030 is to support balanced regional enterprise development. My Department and its agencies contribute to this agenda in several ways, including through the nine regional enterprise plans, REPs. These are bottom-up plans developed and led by regional stakeholders that focus on collaborative initiatives to strengthen the enterprise ecosystem in each region. The north-east regional enterprise plan covers the counties of Cavan, Monaghan and Louth and its steering committee includes stakeholders from the enterprise agencies, local enterprise offices, local authorities, regional skills, higher and further education, Fáilte Ireland and companies in the private sector and others. The north-east regional enterprise plan has 12 actions under five strategic objectives, which focus on areas including decarbonisation, digitalisation and place-making. The last north-east regional enterprise steering committee meeting was held in June 2025. The regional enterprise plans were extended for one year to the end of 2025 with agreement from the regional enterprise plans national oversight group at its meeting on 25 April 2024. This extension provided an additional year for continued implementation of the existing plans and time to review the regional enterprise plan initiative and consider the best approach to the future of the regional enterprise plans. In this context, my Department commissioned an independent review of the regional enterprise plan initiative in 2025. A steering group made up of the regional enterprise stakeholders and Department officials oversaw the review, which included significant engagement with regional enterprise stakeholders, in-depth analysis of the plans and their implementation progress reports and consideration of international approaches to regional enterprise development. This review also included recommendations and options for the future of the regional enterprise plans. I will be considering the complete review, along with the final progress reports for the regional enterprise plans from 2022 to 2025, over the coming months as we plan for the future approach to these matters.

I thank the Minister of State. It is very encouraging to hear all the work that is going into the new plan. The previous plan for County Louth and the rest of the region demonstrated a real commitment to multi-agency co-operation between Government enterprise agencies, local authorities, higher education institutions and the private sector. We see that when they work collaboratively, we get results. I will repeat that Louth, in particular, has unique strategic opportunities that need to be reflected in the new plan. As I said previously, the newest university in the country - an all-Ireland university - will be situated in Dundalk. It is central to the Belfast-Dublin economic corridor. Louth is a most important county. It is in the mid-east and north-east plans, which shows us how integral Louth is. It has strong transport connectivity, a deep manufacturing and agrifood base and a growing innovation ecosystem anchored in Dundalk. Its higher education and research capacity, the Advanced Manufacturing Training Centre of Excellence in Dundalk and the connected health and well-being centre in Dundalk Institute of Technology, DkIT, have positioned Louth as a leader in digitalisation, advanced manufacturing and health innovation.

I acknowledge the Deputy's advocacy for Louth and the north east. That is really significant and important. We want to get the regional enterprise plans back up and running in 2026. As part of that, we have looked at ensuring there are programme managers based in each of the local authorities. That is really important to drive implementation, but also to give the accountability piece. We will be focusing on 12 actions under the five strategic objectives, as I stated earlier, one being around decarbonisation and climate action, to ensure that many companies and SMEs have digitalisation and the capability within their own organisations and also around leveraging growth sectors. We have seen real positivity within Louth, as the Deputy said earlier. Back in January 2025, MSD Ireland announced it was expanding its Irish operations with its acquisition of WuXi vaccines in Dundalk and the creation of up to 1,000 new jobs across Ireland, including 150 roles in Dundalk. We want the enterprise plans to be a core part of each of the regions and very much part of that is the key agencies working in tandem with private and Government agencies.

I absolutely agree with the Minister of State. It is really important that we look at that inter-county connectivity between the counties in each region but also at how, in this new plan, we can utilise what we have in each area. I refer to our higher and further education institutions and investment in driving innovation and research, not only in the bigger companies and IDA companies but also in our small SMEs to see how we can make them more efficient and support them to scale up. If we are talking about a regional plan, particularly in the Border region that has been economically disadvantaged over the last century, we need to be a little bit more innovative, potentially with a cross-Border focus to see how we can co-operate cross-Border in relation to those 11 counties across the Border region to make sure we are really benefiting from the capacity and what we have on the Border region, particularly in counties Louth, Cavan and Monaghan.

Again, as I said earlier, this Government is very much committed to ensuring we have the skills and talent within each of our regions. We have had a real focus on apprenticeships and upskilling. We very much want that to be a core part of the regional skill set forums, driving investments into areas where it has the talent. Indeed, regional enterprise plans will be a key driver in that regard, working with further and higher education institutes. We know how important that is in terms of workforce planning. We have seen successes then within the pharmaceutical and hi-tech sectors where we have graduates with engineering or life science skills to take up employment in these areas. That is a core part and component. Part of that is ensuring that local authorities and regional stakeholders are part of the discussions in terms of what is the right fit or what are the right sectors within each of our regions across the nine sectors that are under the regional enterprise plans. We very much want to push this out into 2026 and ensure they are up and running and are measurable and accountable to the oversight group.