Mr. Michael McCarthy:

We are meeting both of those representative bodies in March. At a good practice seminar in Kilkenny at the end of last year, the AILG was present. I know from experience in a previous life that the work the AILG and LAMA do has been hugely important. There is a base of 939 elected members, though I know not all will be active in AILG. It provides an important service and, in a pre-digitisation and pre-Google era, it was important to get those publications from the AILG outlining issues of national importance, their relevance to local areas and issues other local authorities experienced. That broadened my horizon at that point in my political career. We are meeting those bodies in March, adding to that theme of developing the relationship with them and taking their views on board in terms of how we approach our work streams.