IDA chief: Connect Ireland ‘not ideal’ job creation model

The IDA and Connect Ireland are in dispute about the number of jobs that have been created by the scheme over the last five years

Terry Clune

The chief executive of the IDA has said the model of the Terry Clune-backed Connect Ireland, the job creation scheme the state agency scrapped earlier this year, was “not ideal” from the beginning.

Martin Shanahan told the Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee that it was not his call when the decision was made to start the scheme, but that “it was evident reasonably quickly that the model was not ideal, to be honest”.

The ...