THE cost to the taxpayer of each job created by Shannon Development is almost half that of each job created by the IDA or Enterprise Ireland.
New figures show that for every job which Shannon Development creates, the exchequer hands over €7,552. That’s in comparison with a cost of €14,287 for each job created by IDA Ireland and €12,254 for any job created by Enterprise Ireland.
The official figures were supplied to the Dáil Committee on Jobs, Social Protection and Education on foot of a request by Deputy Willie O’Dea, who is a member of the committee.
Concerned that a section in the current Programme for Government states its intention to examine whether there is a role for the development body in the future, Mr O’Dea said:
“This just goes to prove that Shannon Development is a very efficient body.
“It would be foolish in the extreme to consider abolishing a job creation agency which is getting people into employment at such a low cost – the figures speak for themselves.
“You can’t argue with the facts. It’s creating jobs at half the cost to the taxpayer when compared with the bigger agencies. It would be ludicrous to abolish this small agency which does a fantastic job.”
The cost per job is a figure calculated by Forfás and is arrived at after taking into account the job-creating agency’s spend. The figure is calculated over a seven year period.
Responding to the deputy’s comments, Enterprise Ireland said that while that figure is correct for the period 2004 – 20010, their cost per job for the seven years to 2008 was “€7,794, which is comparable to other agencies during that period.”
Factors affecting the rise in cost were the extra supports provided by Enterprise Ireland to help companies withstand the worst recession in decades and the fact that Enterprise Ireland administers schemes such as dairy beef and sheep funds for third parties.
The lower number of jobs sustained in that period by the agency was also due to the recession and particularly affected by the fact that Enterprise Ireland works with one of the worst hit industries, construction.
There was no comment available from IDA Ireland at time of going to press.
