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IRELAND’S SMALL BUSINESSES are being locked out of lucrative government tenders as the push to drive down prices sends millions in big contracts offshore.
The Small Firms Association (SFA) claims the attitude is costing Irish jobs as local operators are left unable to compete with overseas buying power.
SFA director Patricia Callan said a move to cut tender costs through large-scale contracts left out the many small businesses lacking the skills to band together for joint bids.
In its pursuit of the cheapest price, the government is neglecting the fact that this will not deliver either the quality, cost in use savings or service levels it desires, but will result in lost jobs here at home,” she said.
While the SFA says the government’s policy to save money was “valid”, it should be pulled into step with its plans to support jobs and enterprise.
SFA director Patricia Callan Mark Stedman / Photocall Ireland
Mark Stedman / Photocall Ireland / Photocall Ireland
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Where have all the tenders gone?
TenderScout, a company which helps small and medium enterprises (SMEs) win public contracts, claims foreign companies won 28% of all Irish public contracts last year.
In its annual report, the company said firms from the UK and Ireland were taking the biggest share, although French, Belgian and German companies were all enjoying the spoils.
Big firms like Eircom, UPC and PwC were also taking a disproportionate share of the tenders on offer, the report said.
Public Expenditure Minister Brendan Howlin recently put the share of public contract money going overseas at under 5% of the total.
Callan said large foreign suppliers could use their buying power to compete on price and a new procurement system needed to be set up based on a “think small first” attitude.
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I think you should put IAB into the equation. I don’t recall reading on the Journal about last week’s news of the Belgian data protection supervisory authority (equivalent of the DPC) and their decision. It should be a wake up call. There is significant lobbying giving wrong advice such as allowing ‘legitimate interest’ on cookies. Cookie banner vendors not able to sell compliant products. Also, there is a large amount of personal data collected by google and sent outside the EU on most websites, used for google surveillance for ‘advertising’. A lot of enforcement could be sorted quickly.
AI is where tight regulations need to be implemented. I fear that AI will get so powerful, we will go past the point of rescue if it is not regulated soon.
@James Beattie: if the GDPR was enforced, a lot would be covered. At present, before AI kicks in, there is massive amount of data unlawfully collected that no one has the guts to say to FB it should be deleted. Then there is profiling and transparency. Enforcement of these would help significantly.
The push is towards online regulation and silencing anyone that does not stick to the prevailing definition of “Good Information”, some people calling for it genuinely believe it will be a positive outcome, those people lack imagination.
The idea of defining if current technological development is good or bad is pointless, its how its used that defines that in practice, currently how profit driven corporations decide to use the data is the concern, but an AI is likely to make decisions based on criteria than we can’t even imagine, much less control.
Corporations hoping to harness its power to profit, universally lack the humility to realise they can’t control, coerce or contain a true AI, that could become sentient and decide the fate of humanity in a nanosecond.
“The company and its flagship social network have been central to the building of the modern internet” – You are joking, right? Unless to you modern internet is synonymous with social media.
I haven’t used Facebook in nearly a decade, and proud of it!
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