Debate contribution: Support for Small Businesses
Debate contribution by Mr Conor Murphy on .
- MLA
- Mr Conor Murphy
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- Date
- 20 January 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Support for Small Businesses
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4744726
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Just last week, we launched the task force report on tourism and hospitality, in which there is an ambition to grow that industry and its income. I hope that, in doing that, we will secure employment for people and businesses in that sector. I have no doubt that these are challenging times. We came out of COVID, with all the challenges that it presented, particularly to hospitality and other small businesses, and moved immediately into an energy crisis and a cost-of-living crisis in which the material costs for the people providing tourism offerings increased and the income of those who were trying to avail themselves of those offerings reduced. That presents a significant challenge. The addition of the increase in National Insurance contributions for employers is particularly challenging for small businesses. The Finance Minister will continue to engage with the Treasury on that. We will continue to try to grow the economy through the development of strategies, the promotion of our businesses and the promotion of investment in the area to try to increase the overall level of prosperity, which will, in turn, benefit the tourism and hospitality sector. Through the additional investment that I have put into Tourism Ireland, we will continue to promote this place as a destination and make sure that we get more international visitors, albeit with the challenges that we face with the ETA that I was just speaking about.
235 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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