New energy investment, Brexit relief, PTSB’s future, and the economics of babysitting

One of Europe's biggest renewable energy producers may invest ¤1.5bn in electricity generators in Republic, including a wind farm about 30km off the Dublin coast that could generate up to 500 mega watts (MW) of electricity, enough to power about 500,000 homes. Barry O'Halloran has the details.

Irish industry groups expressed relief about the six month extension to Brexit, writes Simon Carswell. According to Aidan Flynn of Freight Transport Association Ireland: "It is a relief because the Government and the industry were nowhere near ready."

In the North, few grasp the dual dangers of Brexit and a stalled Stormont better than the CBI boss for Northern Ireland Angela McGowan. She tells Eoin Burke-Kennedy "companies won't come into the region until there's clarity about trade conditions."

Back in the world of banking and AIB's recently installed chief executive, Colin Hunt, told an Oireachtas committee yesterday the bank expects to reduce its non-performing loan exposure by between ¤2 billion and ¤3 billion by the end of this year.

Irish businesses welcome Brexit extension

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UK faces prospect of endless negotiations with the EU post-Brexit

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Housing and hospitality lead rise in consumer prices

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Banks, lawyers and wages driving up costs of business

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Meanwhile, having been on the verge of collapse, Permanent TSB is back in profit and lending again, writes Joe Brennan in this week's Agenda, but questions remain over its future ownership.

Mark Paul's Caveat column looks at the increasingly bitter row brewing between the country's biggest hotelier, Dalata boss Pat McCann, and Fáilte Ireland over his scathing slapdown of their call for Dublin to have a 1,000-bedroom super-hotel. It now seems that Fáilte Ireland may be interested in actively developing such a venue to house conference visitors under one roof.

Finally, John FitzGerald casts an economist's eye over the perennial family problem of finding babysitters and writes that babysitting co-ops, where members build up credits with each other, may offer a solution.

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