Murphy welcomes Intertrade commitment

Sinn Féin MLA Conor Murphy has welcomed an additional financial commitment by Minister Jonathan Bell to Intertrade Ireland at a time when the organisation faced the possibility of having to cut core programmes due to budget cuts.

“A planned unilateral cut to the Intertrade Ireland budget by Minister Bell will now not go ahead. Instead, he has pledged an additional £206,000 to Intertrade Ireland for the coming year, representing an 8 per cent lift on 2015 funding,” he explained.

“Both myself and my colleague Megan Fearon had met with Intertrade on this issue so we certainly welcome the Minister’s engagement over Christmas and the New Year with Intertrade Ireland and his Dublin Ministerial counterpart, Richard Bruton, on these budget difficulties.

“This resolution means there is now no threat to continued Irish Government funding to the cross-border body on a 2:1 basis.

“In the Assembly our colleague Máirtín Ó Muilleoir raised the recent report by Intertrade into cross-border job creation and it’s our hope that in the time ahead we can provide the agency with the additional funds it needs to leverage the potential of all-island sectoral ecosystems.

Murphy added, “Given that 50 per cent of Intertrade Ireland’s work is with northern companies and it has helped create 3,000 jobs and spurred £1bn in cross-border trade, it’s crucial that funding is not only maintained but increased for Intertrade Ireland in the time ahead.”

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Posted by Newry Times News on Jan 25 2016. Filed under Business, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry