Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will be short and sweet. I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to ask a few questions. I shall direct one question to the witnesses from Offaly County Council and its local enterprise office, LEO. I have looked at their Facebook and web pages which, as Mr. Tobin has said, is where a lot of business-led hubs would need to have the anchor tenant. Enterprise Ireland might be interested to hear that I held a discovery day some weeks ago in Portumna where we had a number of employees from a particular large financial institution based in Limerick. We learned that this company's employees make up 30 cars going across the bridge every single morning. The company has a capacity issue: it wants to expand but does not have car parking facilities. An ideal location would be the sort of idea that we are referring to, where one can expand from. From there I went into the website to see where the local employment office gets right in behind it. I thought the web page was fantastic and it gave me a good steer around Offaly and what it is about. One of my questions at the last meeting was about the roll-out of the LEOs and the support role they play. Do the LEOs meet bi-monthly or half yearly to share information from one LEO to another? During the earlier contributions I heard that €34 million is available to the LEOs to support businesses and so on, but the sharing of the information is also important so that every county council is on the same platform.

How do we get the idea of the change concept into the schools? Reference was made to the library. The library is absolutely a valuable tool, be it in second or third level education, when one needs to finish a project. It is possibly not for the high end aspect of attracting business. I do not agree with libraries in that context, but they are definitely valuable to the second and third level students who want to complete their projects. Is there a plan with LEO or Enterprise Ireland to deliver that model and to educate children to use different units that are available, as opposed to them spending their weekends in Galway, for example, because they cannot get broadband in Ballinakill? If, however, one was to go down the road to Abbey or Killimor there is a library available. Would the witnesses agree that we need to train children how to plan their study patterns a little differently?

How will the representatives from Enterprise Ireland engage with the banks and businesses that have capacity issues around accommodation for their businesses and employees? They sometimes cannot get the accommodation because premiums for space are so high. Are the representatives looking to the wider sphere such as the one hour commute? The Portumna region, for example, is one hour from Galway, one hour from Limerick and one hour from Athlone. The Chairman's area is no different. We need to look at these commuter towns. When I speak about buildings I mean those places such as the Dowager House in Portumna - which is owned by the Office of Public Works, OPW and is completely kittled out. As opposed to having the businesses buying why are we not re-using the properties that are available? What engagements do the witnesses have with other Departments and agencies - such as the OPW - that have very good buildings that are not being used? These premises may have car-parking spaces and other facilities, and their use could keep towns alive.