Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

First, I thank members for their welcome for the Government's decision yesterday. That decision and my recommendations to the Government were greatly informed by the exchanges I had had with this committee in recent years. We have discussed a number of times the extent to which Ireland, when compared with other countries of similar size, maintains a small presence abroad. Ireland has a total of 73 missions, with 56 embassies, while the Netherlands has 58 missions, with 1,500 diplomats in the field, compared with Ireland's figure of slightly more than 300. We are in a competitive environment and one can make similar comparisons elsewhere. The Government has been putting a particular focus on what is called economic diplomacy, that is, promoting trade and, in particular, Ireland's economic interests abroad. That is the reason, when the Government was formed, the then Department of Foreign Affairs was given the added mandate to co-ordinate the trade effort across government. A number of Departments and Government agencies are involved in the trade efforts of the State. Obviously, these include the Departments of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Education and Skills and Transport, Tourism and Sport. The State agencies include IDA Ireland, Enterprise Ireland, Bord Bia and Tourism Ireland. That is quite a range of bodies and the Government co-ordinates all of this through the Export Trade Council, which I chair. It is responsible for the review of trade strategy and, as Deputy Brendan Smith noted, that strategy was published at the end of 2010. It is now being reviewed and I expect the outcome of that review will be considered at the next meeting of the Export Trade Council which will take place in February, following which I expect to bring a report to the Government.

It may interest committee members, to get a flavour of the extent of the work done over the course of 2013, that under the trade strategy, 27 co-ordinated plans have been developed with the State agencies for Ireland's priority markets. We undertook 136 high level visits, with a significant economic and promotional dimension, across 52 countries last year. There were 656 events and engagements promoting Irish tourism and The Gathering directly to almost 300,000 people from the time of its worldwide launch in March 2012. There were 661 engagements to promote Ireland's economic positions to officeholders internationally. There were 734 specific engagements to facilitate trade and investment supporting Irish jobs. In the St. Patrick's Day period alone, there were 70 focused company engagements and business events involving more than 8,500 Irish and international company representatives. There were engagements with 1,152 representatives of the international media. Ireland was promoted directly to 778,000 people assembled in various audiences over the course of 2013. The promotion of economic messages through op-ed articles, interviews and media work was done to an audience estimated to have been in excess of 53 million. Moreover, access was renewed for Irish products to nine international markets, with a combined population of 1.5 billion people.

As for the specific questions raised, Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan asked about the control of expenditure. Apart from the presentation of the Estimates which is done by both the Minister of State, Deputy Joe Costello, and me, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade comes under the ambit of the Comptroller and Auditor General. It is subject to examination by the Committee of Public Accounts which the Secretary General attends as Accounting Officer. Moreover, in respect of the aid programme, we have an auditing system with which the committee is reasonably familiar. The Department is in the process of appointing a financial controller, which, again, will enhance its financial governance.

On the issue of Iran which has been raised by Deputies Maureen O'Sullivan, Seán Crowe and Eric Byrne, I gave consideration to the reopening of the embassy in Tehran. The Department's consideration of the review of missions and where they are located has been under way for some time. It has been under way over the course of the last year, in particular, especially since the completion of the Presidency. Tehran, obviously, was one of the capitals to which consideration was given. Were Ireland opening more embassies, we would be positive about it. The situation in Iran is changing and I greatly welcome what is happening on the nuclear issue. As members are aware, last Monday the Foreign Affairs Council of the European Union relaxed the sanctions on Iran as a consequence of the progress that had been made.

I want to make it clear that we are positive about the prospects for reopening an embassy in Tehran. It is an issue to which I would like to be able to return as the situation improves.

Deputy Eric Byrne is correct that the administrative budget is significantly down since 2008. That is due to a combination of factors, the first of which is the reductions in pay and the number of staff in the Department. It is a case of the Department and its staff producing more with less. A great tribute is due to the staff of the Department who have done an outstanding job, particularly in the past couple of years when we have been in crisis and trying to get Ireland's message out.

The intention is that we will open the embassies this year. This is the programme for 2014. As Deputy Eric Byrne will be aware, in some cases we must rent accommodation. The agreement of the host countries where the embassies and consulates will be located will be have to be secured also. Barring any unforeseen obstacle, our intention is to do this in 2014.

As I said, this is an exercise that has been under way for some time and it has been informed. We have published the review of aid policy, by which the exercise has been informed. It has also been informed by the committee's report on the work of the Department in the economic area which was presented before Christmas. It has been informed by the discussions I have had here. I also have available to me the draft review of trade policy and I am in a position to see where it is going. We will look at it again in the light of the overall review of the country's foreign policy, something that is down for later in the year.

On the Irish Presidency, in response to Deputy Bernard J. Durkan, it is difficult to quantify the value achieved because reputational value is difficult to measure and has a long tail. The cost of the previous Irish Presidency in 2004 was €110 million. We set out to do it for half that figure in the case of the Presidency in 2013. As it turns out, we have done better than this. We estimate that the total cost of the Presidency was €42.5 million, 40% of the cost incurred in 2004.