I note today a report in a newspaper regarding the Companies Registration Office, CRO, filing deadline of 25 November and very unsatisfactory responses allegedly being given to those who have sought extensions to that deadline. I ask the Minister to raise with his Cabinet colleague, the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the possibility of extending the deadline beyond 25 November. More people will be working from home from now on and will not have the same access to the documents they need. A little bit of latitude, similar to what was shown last year, would be welcome. Effectively, regardless of the date of filing, companies were treated as if they had filed on time. I ask that the same system is put in place this year, given the Covid-related announcements in recent days. This is required and would be very much appreciated by many businesses.

The filing of annual returns has continued throughout the period of Covid-19. To date this year more than 215,000 annual returns have been filed. While a small number of practitioners are experiencing difficulties relating to annual returns for their clients, there does not appear to be a widespread issue of filing problems. The CRO has approximately 48,500 annual returns at various stages of processing. It has been an exceptional year due to a series of filing extensions which were granted in response to pressure on companies due to the pandemic. There were delays because of Covid, especially with the last filing extension which ended on 11 June, but the information given to me indicates the problem is not widespread.