Speaking at a Fine Gael fundraising event this week, Minister for Finance, Michael Noonan, said that “very strong innovation” was the key to ensuring economic recovery for the country.
He went on to say that every child over the age of five should be given access to an iPad to make Ireland a more tech-aware country.
“We must use the schools to drive it,” he said.
“You need to organise people in a way (so that) they are working in teams to combine the innovative efforts of individuals to do something dramatic.”
“We certainly should have every child with an iPad at five years of age,” he added.
Fine Gael will shortly be publishing their manifesto ahead of next year’s General Election and Noonan’s comments are a reflection of the party’s focus on making Ireland a destination for tech companies. Their strategy to target younger children and expand their digital acumen is part of their proposed measures to attract power players in the tech industry and research and development companies to the country.
He speculated that Ireland’s “boom and bust cycle” was caused by a relying too heavily on one sector. “The booms were great, then the bust came and loads of people lost their jobs, it lasted several years, and the next cycle was engineered. We must get away from that,” he said.
