Mr. John Moran:

To take the last part of Deputy Kyne's question first, I cover a fair bit of the countryside between the midlands and the west. There are towns that have not got the message that they need to improve their overall image. It can be a killer. If the main street of any town looks dull, the immediate image is of nothing happening. On the other hand, if a town's image is positive because it has been painted and cleaned, that is a first step. The message needs to be extended. It is simple, but it is positive and many small towns need to embrace it.

The LEOs are fairly new organisations and need time to bed in. I do not know the timeline for them to become effective, but they should theoretically be a major player in this regard. Our focus is on marketing as a business must have a market to be effective. Unfortunately, LEOs do not place this emphasis on marketing. However, I see no major conflict there.

In one of our studies, we examined an OECD report that strategised and practised local development from the ground up. The OECD believes it has devised some competent models. I have provided the committee with an insight into the OECD's thinking in this regard. The future will be bottom-up development across the board, including education and economic development. The OECD conducted a report on this for the Welsh Assembly recently. There is a parallel with Ireland. If one wants to know which structures work, the local development structure has that potential. Go back far enough and consider our success stories, for example, local credit unions, which responded to a need. They were set up in small villages and towns. Now, we need to rebuild local economies. We can harness local development. We have a legacy in this regard. We are not just inventing it. The co-op movement stemmed from a need to do something. We must revisit this approach. As to how to do this in co-operation with LEOs, we should not try to reinvent the wheel. Rather, we should try for a level of co-operation that suits the existing skill sets.

That said, we do work that LEOs do not. A marketing focus is central from our point of view. We want to do the same in terms of tourism. Ireland generally has a good tourism product, but it is like a jigsaw - we have the bits and pieces. We are trying to integrate our tourism offering so that people are encouraged to stay in areas for longer. There are synergies with Fáilte Ireland in pushing this agenda along.