Mr. Paul Hannigan:

I thank Deputy Smith for his contribution. I remember when he visited and he got a good feel for what is happening up here. In response to the question on the State agencies, both IDA and Enterprise Ireland reside in our co-lab facility as I mentioned earlier. We have very close contact with both organisations in terms of their engagement. In terms of developing new courses and opportunities around research, real benefit comes from engagement with companies themselves. We have really strong relationships with many of the FDI and Enterprise Ireland client companies that have been set up in terms identifying their needs and how we can meet them proactively in order to continue skills-based development within the region and to anchor those companies here. In Letterkenny alone there are approximately 4,500 people in FDI employment and 60% of them are graduates from here. We are also involved with Enterprise Ireland companies in Killybegs specifically looking at the development of the marine. There are real opportunities there.

In terms of the development of the technological universities, Deputy Smith asked about the timescale. It is our ambition to submit the application by the end of this year or the beginning of next year and that, having gone through all of the stages, the technological university will be set up by 1 January 2022. That is the target we have set for ourselves. We feel that we can achieve that and that is what we are working towards. We will obviously continue the ongoing collaboration with the University of Ulster. As I said earlier, the fact that the HEA is willing to fund both initiatives out of the same pot of money for a period of time is a recognition of the importance of both and the necessity to keep both of them going. That will continue.

I will ask Professor Ó Néill to address the research question but I would just say that a meeting is being co-ordinated by SFI in the next couple of weeks specifically to look at North-South collaboration. There has been some work done in that space.