Ms Claire McGee:

I have it there. Many of the great challenges we are all facing which have been clearly articulated, such as the transition to the low-carbon economy and digitalisation, are big issues that will not be solved on our own. Therefore, we need to collaborate. It is important for enterprise and for business to collaborate with the education system because we are there in the vanguard of many of these changes.

How do we empower the teachers and the career guidance services, as Ms McMahon pointed out, who are very much dealing with the urgent issues of pastoral care in many cases and do not have the capacity, timewise, to focus on this evolving economy and outside? How do we keep them up to pace then? It is very important for industry, which has the capacity, to be able to go into the classroom and help students and the educators come up out of the curriculum and see the world and the opportunities around them.

Industry is doing this and I would very much like to do a project on adding up the value in both that in-kind and cash contributions the ESB referred to there, such as the ESB Science Blast and the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition. How do we also support smaller enterprises to get more out of the education system and get the schools to get more out of smaller enterprises in that engagement? There are great opportunities to do this. We are probably disorganised in how we do it and it is a little of an ad hocapproach. It depends on the school and the principal. Some school teachers and leaders were also mentioned. We very much need to support school leaders as they are dealing with a great deal of change and many external factors. Enterprise also has a role there. How do we manage change on a peer-to-peer basis? I believe there are great opportunities there.