Department of Finance taking over IFSC strategy

Responsibility within Government for developing the international financial services (IFS) sector here has been moved to the Department of Finance from the Taoiseach’s office.

This mirrors the recent appointment of Eoghan Murphy as Minister of State for financial services at the Department of Finance.

A statement by the Department of Finance on Thursday said this would provide a “more co-ordinated and streamlined approach” to the Government’s IFS 2020 Strategy, which is designed to create 10,000 net new jobs over the next four years.

International financial services has come under the umbrella of the Department of the Taoiseach since Charlie Haughey’s time in office. Haughey was one of the driving forces behind the establishment of the IFSC in Dublin during his time as taoiseach. Responsibility for the IFS 2020 secretariat and support has now been assigned to the Department of Finance.

Liaise

Mr Murphy is to liaise with the IDA and

Enterprise Ireland

over the coming months to promote the Irish international financial services sector overseas under the new IFS Ireland banner brand. This will include visits to the UK, the US, Denmark and Asia (Hong Kong, China and Japan).

The department also issued an IFS 2020 progress report for the second quarter. This confirmed that Ireland would host a second annual European Financial Forum at Dublin Castle on January 24th next year. This follows the success of the inaugural event this year, which attracted more than 600 delegates from around the world.

“The forum offers an unparalleled opportunity for investors and key decision-makers from financial markets around the world to get an overview of the financial, business, FinTech and regulatory landscape in Europe, and will showcase Ireland’s international financial services environment to an international audience,” Mr Murphy said.

The Minister said he was pleased with the progress being made to implement the measures outlined in the action plan for 2016, which confirmed that all 10 headline actions “remain on track for completion within the calendar year”.