David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

My time is tight. There are 31 LEOs and they all work independently in their respective local authority areas. It has been put to me, and again this is from Enterprise Ireland's own website, that given the range of skills required for people who are starting up and growing small businesses or SMEs, the diversity is huge. I put it to Mr. Carey that there cannot be expertise in every LEO to deal with every possible question, issue or company type that might be out there. LEOs often do not physically visit a company but do a lot of work on the phone and remotely.

Should we look at the whole of the structure and specialisation? For example, if I am in County Cork and am setting up or working in a company that makes widgets and there is nobody in the Cork office with expertise in that area or who knows anything about it but there is somebody in Country Donegal, yet the person in County Donegal cannot talk to me. Should we look at the structure and perhaps specialising or deepening the specialisms more so that they do not all have to do everything? There could be a national network. I wish to hear Mr. Carey's thoughts on that.