Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I fully agree that we need to look at how this will impact different regions and areas and what we can do to respond to the challenges it creates. It will be around retraining, new opportunities, setting up enterprises, and seeding enterprise hubs. Some of the machinery for that is already in place. When I was Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, the Department had regional enterprise bodies, which are generally led by someone from the private sector, with representatives from all relevant entities involved. We have regional enterprise funds, disruptive technology funds, climate changes funds and funds for rural and urban areas. Some of the material we have put out relates very much to the development of bottom-up initiatives but if there is need for additional catalysts to bring this together, I am open to that. The conference in Poland is taking place in Silesia, which is located in the depths of Polish coal-mining country. The emphasis there is very much on how to develop a transition for such a region to a new economy.