I am very proud to come from a small village called Kinnitty where we have benefited significantly from multimillion euro investment in the public realm, public services and the development of the Slieve Bloom mountain bike trails. However, in the last 12 months, we have lost our post office and our last shop, which had served the community for decades. Thankfully, a 68-year-old man, Mr. Jodie Flaherty, has stepped into the breach to open a new shop. However, it is a reflection of the challenges in the market conditions and trading environment for micro-businesses in small villages right across the country. I appreciate the measures the Minister has introduced through, for example, the local enterprise office in terms of supports, but there is a concern around viability. I ask the Minister and the wider Government to ensure there are further measures to make sure the viability of our micro-businesses in the best interests of our public good, our economic good and our social good.

I acknowledge the huge work Deputy Clendennen is doing in being a firm advocate for our small family businesses. I know, as Minister for enterprise, that they employ two thirds of people right across our community. We have taken a number of initiatives this year around viability and worked to ensure that they are more viable, including setting up our small business unit and working with our cost of doing business advisory forum, which is looking at the interoperability of regulators that are currently on our landscape and ensuring we are doing things faster and being agile as an economy. We also have a huge amount of work to do, as is outlined in the programme for Government, related to other viability measures. We will work with Deputy Clendennen to ensure our small businesses continue to grow. As I pointed out in my earlier contribution, all 13 sectors of the economy are in a strong growth phase right now.