Ms Margrethe Vestager:

I thank the Deputy. The idea of rural proofing is to see how proposals work outside of an urban area because there is a difference between people living closer together and people living much more spread out. These are different communities and there is a different dynamic, but that does not change the fact that we should be sensitive to these differences between urban and rural. We are working to be better at doing that kind of analysis in order to see how legislation will work for everyone.

Second, on the question on how young people are being heard, that is a really good question because we do not necessarily have specific youth panels. What we see is that there are a lot of young people worrying about having the right competences and whether we learn what we need to learn at school in order to be qualified for the jobs to come. This is one of the reasons we treat digital skills as a very hard strategic priority, not with education as a side thing or by treating it as if we can always put education here or there, but that it is a central thing and, without education, it will not work. I will take the inspiration and think about how more young people can be included.

It is also a point that goes for older people. For those aged 70 years today, in the next 20 years digitisation will only increase and more and more public services will come in digital formats. Therefore, it is never too late to get the digital skills in order for people to fully feel they are part of their society and they can benefit from the different services being delivered. People who are 70 today may well be here for the next 20 or 30 years. It is very important that we take the different generations on board in that respect.

On the key areas for investment, as I said earlier, I really think connectivity must be a key area and the second must be skills. We cannot leave anyone to say that digital society is not for them and that it is not important whether they feel empowered or not. The citizen’s empowerment to deal with this is of the essence because, otherwise, there is a risk that we get societies where people do not feel they belong, and I think that is the worst thing that can happen. They may be fired from a job but if they feel they are being fired from their country or their society, where do they go then? Skills are of the essence.

When it comes to the data centres, with regard to the technology to get the next generation of semiconductors to use less electricity and less power, we have what we call an important project of common European interest that is working exactly on semiconductors to bring that down. The second thing is to organise the data centres so they can run on renewables, like everything else, but also that excess heating can be used. I know it is a quirky example but in Paris they have organised a pool next to a data centre, so the excess heat actually heats the pool for the people living around the data centre. I think that is quite a sweet example.