Ms Deirdre Forde:

Mr. Murphy stole my thunder in telling the committee that we will debate CAP at the next plenary session. We will make sure the Irish perspective is properly promoted at that debate.

There is a major benefit in promoting a one-stop-shop approach to the Single Market programme at regional level. Communication could be improved in promoting the Your Europe and SOLVIT portals, which any citizen can access and have a question answered immediately. The chain between the EU and national, regional and local governments is rusty in places. Meetings between the committee and members of the regional assemblies would be extremely beneficial in helping the committee see how the local authorities could do more. Hitherto, the local authorities seem to only be about delivering services but we are moving into the area of economic development and we have a larger role to play in responding to citizens' needs and hosting different forums that could debate issues such as climate action and what people want from their regions. We could have a co-ordinated approach to getting that message through Europe and the national assembly and back down to local level again.