Matt Shanahan warns Ireland must future-proof education and economy

Thank you for your luck. Firstly, I would like to acknowledge the visit of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to Ireland these past days and to thank them for continuing to build on the friendship between our two countries. I think the warmth and generosity of spirit being shown to them by the Irish people is appropriate and underlines the close relationship our two islands share. I am sure they are aware of our joint economic relationships and the challenging conditions that a hard Brexit might deliver between our two states. It is in our combined interests that Ireland and the United Kingdom and our EU partners should continue working closely together to achieve a managed Brexit that minimises the impact to our mutual trading relationships and does nothing to diminish the respect that has been fostered between our two nations, particularly over recent decades. Notwithstanding the importance of our shared ambition, recent media reports a hardening stance by the new UK government to aspects of its negotiating position in terms of the withdrawal agreement passed by the House of Commons. I know this House would wish our future trade teams every success along with those of the UK and EU in arriving at a satisfactory agreement that meets the needs of all concerned. The substance of this new future trading agreement will be a matter of negotiation but I believe it will highlight longer term political, economic and social challenges for Ireland in terms of our own national strategic planning which at its heart must deliver equity and fairness and secure the future of our vibrant country and its people. I believe we in Ireland are facing increasing challenges to remain at the forefront of European decision making and politicians negotiating on our behalf must continue to ensure our open economy remains a European centre embracing advancing world leading technological change. It is my opinion that for Ireland to continue to retain its place as a first world country providing for all her people we can no longer defer consideration of the social cultural, cultural, cultural, cultural, environmental and economic shifts that we will need to make in order to future proof our national competitiveness thus enabling advancement of the social prosperity of our people. The technological economy is enlarging with great speed and is not alone transforming the way we live but also the way we work. Many of our standard work practices and work areas are being challenged and many traditional jobs will disappear over coming years to be replaced by new opportunities that will require new learning. Industries slow to adapt to the utilization of technology in their manufacturing, innovation and service delivery will find themselves increasingly exposed to international price led competition. This information age which we see in evidence all around us will become completely transformative increasingly displacing traditional jobs. A simple example of the challenging effects of globalization can be seen in our educational output and in Ireland retaining and deploying the significant engineering, technical, scientific and and medical competencies that our third level institutions graduate every year. An example of a peer country is India where a huge focus has been placed on literacy and education and where millions graduate annually as doctors, engineers, scientists, researchers and many will work in industries that we in Ireland want and need to attract. Without continuously resourcing a dynamic technologically driven ambition for Ireland, our economy will fail to grow adequately and compete such to sustain the required national income levels that support our population needs and changing demographic challenges such as adequately reserving for pension needs and elderly care. In understanding such challenges we must set policy objectives particularly in education and future learning that prepares our next generations for success into the world in which they are entering. I will contend that one such objective is a regional functioning third level education system which delivers courses and graduates to meet the requirements of our advanced employers. We need it to exhibit regional balance to be based on critical mass with opportunity to scale. Significant opportunity exists through the disciplines of STEAM, an acronym for science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics. Along with traditional areas such as history, geography, economics and languages graduates can expect to immerse themselves in areas such as big data, artificial intelligence, complex programming, machine based learning systems, robotic interfaces etc. They must also become adept in the creation of thought leadership to deliver innovation, problem solve and deliver accelerated learning. Achieving such high ambition around the country will require a step change in the educational attitude and attainment of our students and of our third level institutions and government must begin to provide substance to such policies. In my own constituency of Waterford and its surrounding south east region, we have suffered a significant delay in the delivery of a city region university, thus requiring many of our school leavers to access third level courses outside the region. Many failed to return to the region post graduation, thus creating a brain drain and economic benefit foregone. The continuing lack of investment in Waterford Institute of Technology, an institute of over 6,000 undergraduates, over many years has contributed to this regional brain drain and forced the wealth transfer from south east parents as they struggle to fund student education, having to access expensive accommodation sites in Dublin, Cork and Limerick as well as overseas. Indeed, capital investment to the Cork Road campus at WIT was last delivered in 2010 and despite significant investment to other regions, third level facilities, a present application to build a new engineering building on site at WIT remains unactivated. This building, which is awaiting build tender approval, would only marginally improve the College's capacity and ability to increase student uptake. Without significant investment in capital structures at WIT and provision of further STEM course opportunity, the idea of regional regeneration through education remains for Waterford and the south east a promise and policy unfulfilled. This is more than unfortunate for the city and region, given the vibrant tech and pharma clusters that we have developed over the past 20 years. That these industries are crying out for suitably qualified graduates who should be available within the educational ecosystem of the south east, but presently are not there in number, is a feeling that a future government cannot continue in the south east region or in any other. As part of regional rebalancing and regeneration, focus must now also be given to our indigenous SME community. These are largely Irish owned businesses that employ between 10 and 250 people. They are overlooked for enterprise supports, as they do not qualify in both micro enterprise and local enterprise board categories, and they cannot access enterprise Ireland funding if they do not have export-led activity. Again, the opportunity exists for third- and fourth-level institutions to engage with these companies and explore how they might innovate and adapt to counter the possible downturns of a negative Brexit environment. These SMEs represent one of the largest employment groupings in Ireland. They comprise 54% of all those working in the state, and yet bizarrely, they are not represented in social partnership discussions. This, again, is a disparity that a future government must seek to address. The direction of negotiations regarding Brexit remains a matter of discussion, but I welcome the Taoiseach's recently stated position regarding no acceptance of diminishment of cap, which would significantly affect many in Irish agricultural production. A hard Brexit has always presented a clear and present danger to Ireland. Alongside this, a significant consequence for Ireland from Brexit will be the loss of a voting partner in future Commission decisions. It is imperative that we in this House add all momentum to the formation of a new government to deal not only with Brexit, but with the significant challenges we face today. We must also immediately begin planning the equitable rebalancing of Ireland. At its core, policy must secure the future of our Indigenous and multinational industries by providing them opportunity to access the third- and fourth-level skills, education and sports they require. We must also re-test and test again chosen policies on housing, health care, education, environment and economic planning to ensure they can deliver a socially just future with opportunity for all. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 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