Proposals included less red tape, more training for managers and more grants for technology investment. But the enterprise minister knows the surest way to get results: dangling tax breaks.

Minister Martin is considering lifting the threshold for the Business Expansion Scheme . . . due, like many tax shelters, to disappear at the end of this year . . . to a level that would allow wealthy individuals slash their tax bills by more than 100,000 a year.

The proposed move, put forward by the Small Business Forum, comes despite political pressure on government to curb all tax breaks, especially those for property investment.

However, the minister told the Sunday Tribune that he believes there is "a lot of merit" in offering tax breaks to incentivise productivity.

An investigation of tax shelters commissioned by government from consultants Indecon earlier this year drew a distinction between property and other tax breaks, he said.

"The Indecon report concluded that time has run out for tax relief on property, but it didn't rule out incentives for productive capacity in the economy, " the minister said. "One example is the new tax credit for research and development, which incentivises investment away from property. Another is tax relief for new enterprises."

Joan Burton, Labour Party spokeswoman on finance, called for a "strict certification process to ensure that only genuine enterprise projects qualify for BES money".

The initial history of BES was "perverted by a lot of no-risk property development", Burton said.

Since the introduction of BES in 1984, the rules have been tightened from time to time. If Microsoft Ireland boss Joe Macri and his colleagues on the Small Business Forum get their way, BES is heading for a new lease of life.

They believe that the BES and the smaller Seed Capital Scheme (a sort of mini-BES for employees who want to strike out on their own) should be extended until 2013.

They want to double the amount of BES money companies can raise to 2m. And the most controversial proposal would allow individual investors to put up to 250,000 a year into the enterprise scheme and qualify for full tax relief, a whopping increase from the existing cap of 31,750 a year.

This would allow investors to slash their annual tax bills by as much as 105,000.

Even with existing restrictions, BES costs the Exchequer more than 20m a year.

If the Small Business Forum gets its way, this would jump to between 50m and 60m.

This is small beer for a government that wants to be seen to be doing its bit to help a sector that employs 800,000 people and pays 10bn a year in taxes, but it would be tricky to sell the idea of more generous BES incentives at a time when the government is under political pressure to pare back on tax shelters.

Tax experts believe that, in a new era of low interest rates, the sun may have set on BES. One accountant estimates that the potential market for BES funding may have shrunk by 70% over the past decade.

BES has lost some lustre for investors because the government has gradually limited the amount of money they can put in and restricted the types of businesses in which they can invest, as well as forcing them to take on more risk.

"Increasing the threshold to 250,000 won't matter without changes in investors' appetite for risk and in the interest rate environment, " said one tax practitioner.

Business people such as Jerry Kennelly from Tralee, are not so quick to write off BES. He raised 250,000 through the BES in 1999 and last month sold his company, Stockbyte, for 110m.

"BES was a fantastic boost because it bought us time during which the business could breathe and get traction, " Kennelly said of Stockbyte. "It allows a business to create more growth before bringing in the venture capitalists."

For now, Minister Martin is happy to pass the parcel by noting that taxation is an issue for colleague Brian Cowen. If the Small Business Forum's recommendation is taken on board, though, BES may become one of the last refuges for wealthy investors wrestling with a troublesome tax bill.