Mr. Paul Hannigan:

There is a lot of collaboration and work and we are pushing on with the University of Ulster specifically in terms of trying to develop a cross-Border higher education region in the north west. Probably most of the impetus to develop that is coming from ourselves. I think the University of Ulster is very interested in developing it but once the economic circumstances changed on both sides of the Border, everybody went into retrenchment mode and that had a direct impact in terms of how we try to develop this. I think there would be an interest in looking at this issue because the demographics in Northern Ireland, as outlined in their strategy, is that there will be a decline in the number of school leavers for the next ten to 15 years in Northern Ireland. In the South it is the complete opposite. As a result there must be some synergy in terms of how we follow that through.