Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I was trying to establish one point. Sometimes in public bodies - it also happens in the private sector - people can become rather proprietorial about their area. As a consequence, politics goes on and this can be an obstacle to achieving the goals of the mission statement or the objective that the country wishes to achieve. Will the association comment on this? The association referred to something we could usefully support or take up, that is, the association's aspiration to best practice whereby embassies abroad would be evaluated. I know anecdotally that some are especially good because of the personnel they have. These embassies are proactive, positive and constructive in their work. However, I have heard that it can be slipshod in other areas and that it is not uniform throughout the system. The suggestion of a role of some sort for the association has merit. The question is relevant for IBEC as well. Does IBEC monitor the performance of our embassies and agencies abroad? We cannot afford to fail with the objectives and exercises we are undertaking. We must get real value for money and we must get results. Some of what we were saying was somewhat aspirational. Are hard-core evaluations being carried out, rating the successes in these countries or the lack of them? If one carries out peer reviews and comparisons in any organisation one tends to raise the game. We should try to bring everyone up to best practice.