December 7, 2016
Deputy John Deasy asked the Taoiseach the number of net jobs that have been created in Waterford city and county over the past ten years; and the number of these that were created during the past three years.
  
REPLY
The exact information requested by the Deputy is not available. The Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS) is the official source of estimates of employment in the State. The most recent figures available are for Q3 2016.

Estimates of employment are produced by NUTS 3 Regions. The NUTS 3 South-East region includes Carlow, Kilkenny, South Tipperary, Waterford City, Waterford County and Wexford. Due to methodology and sample size it is not possible to produce reliable Waterford City and County estimates from the QNHS.

Table 1a below shows the number of persons aged 15 years and over in employment classified by NUTS 3 South-East region in Q3 of each year from 2006 to 2016.

Table 1b shows the annual change in the numbers of persons aged 15 years and over in employment classified by NUTS 3 South-East region in Q3 of each year from 2007 to 2016.

As Table 1a shows the overall stock of persons employed at given points in time, the annual changes which are calculated using these stock figures depend both on the number of jobs lost and jobs created over the period in question. The QNHS does not record whether a job is newly created.

December 17, 2015
Deputy John Deasy asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the discussions his Department has had with the management at Waterford Regional Airport regarding accessing State or European Union funding to extend the runway at the airport.

REPLY (Minister Paschal Donohue):
Funding support for capital expenditure under my Department's Regional Airports Programme is confined to safety and security related projects.

The projects being funded at Waterford airport under the Programme include the runway end safety area (RESA) as required by the IAA and safety standards. This project involved the purchase of land to facilitate the work. 

Development projects, however, such as any capacity expansions, are a commercial matter for the airports themselves and should only be contemplated if they can be financed commercially. In the case of the proposed runway extension at Waterford, the airport authorities are fully aware of this position and I understand that they are pursuing local interests in relation to that project.

My Department invited all airports and other transport bodies to an Information Seminar earlier this month on the financing options under the European Union's European Fund for Strategic Investment (EFSI), the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) and the EIB.

The seminar was organised by the European Commission, the Innovation and Networks Executive Agency  and the European Investment Bank. A representative from Waterford Airport attended that Seminar and also met separately with the agencies.