| Attendees: | Lord Rana, NICCI |
Geraldine Quinn, FSB |
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Bernie O’Hare, DEL |
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Shane Murphy, DFP |
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Fiona Hepper, DETI |
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Phil Rodgers, DETI |
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Helen McConkey, DETI |
Welcome and Minutes of Last Meeting
1. Lord Rana welcomed members to the 3rd meeting of the Forum's Enterprise Sub-group and noted apologies from Seamus McAleavey, NICVA, Wilfred Mitchell, FSB, Patricia McKeown, NIC/ICTU and Michael Brennan, DFP.
2. The minutes for the 2nd meeting were accepted without amendment.
3. Fiona Hepper reminded members of the concerns raised at the last meeting about funding for Young Enterprise and advised that funding directly from Invest NI for the financial year 2005/06 had been agreed.
Progress Template
4. Lord Rana referred members to the draft progress template which Fiona Hepper had populated, and which had been issued to members for consideration in advance of today’s meeting.
5. Fiona Hepper explained that the template listed 10 actions which needed to be prioritised and reduced to three or four key issues for discussion by members at the plenary meeting of EDF in September.
6. During the discussions which ensued, a number of suggested amendments were agreed and Fiona Hepper undertook to reflect these in a revised draft of the progress template to be issued to members’ via email for approval. On the issue of an action relating to tourism, members agreed that more needed to be done to make NI an attractive place to live and work, not only as a means of attracting investment but also to encourage entrepreneurs to the region.
7. In addition, members agreed that the following actions were not a priority and as such would be removed from the template:
– Assessment of the Impact of EU Regional Aid policy post 2006
– Business networks
8. For the remaining actions, members agreed that these would be streamed under 3 key themes of strategy, research and promotion
ACTION: Fiona Hepper to make agreed amendments to the template, align the remaining actions into 3 key themes and issue to members for clearance.
ACTION: Following the September EDF plenary contact will be made with Business Alliance (BA) for its view on (i) the proposed action in relation to BA representation on a high level Advisory Group to be established following AES review; and (2) the need for additional funding and changes in fiscal policy to allow NI to become self-sustaining.
ACTION: Secretariat to advise DEL and DE of the Federation of Small Businesses work with ANIC and the establishment of a new enterprise scheme.
ACTION: Secretariat to contact Tim Losty at the NI Bureau in Washington to find out more information about the Bureau’s package for selling NI as a place to invest.
ACTION: Secretariat to issue a copy of the Giant Causeway promotional DVD to Sub-group members.
Sub-group’s Report to September EDF
9. Following discussion about the format of the Sub-group’s report for the September EDF it was agreed that each member would consider this and provide input in the form of a couple of paragraphs.
ACTION: All Sub-group members to forward input to the Sub-group’s report to the Secretariat by 5 August and Fiona Hepper will draft the paper.
Any Other Business
Future Meetings
10. Members agreed that future meetings of the Sub-group should be arranged for end of September, October and November 2005.
ACTION: Secretariat to determine members’ availability and advise members of dates and venue for future Sub-group meetings.