Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will give an experience of where I saw it happening. I have been in the national emergency control centre. Wherever we need to go into that, we obviously will. I will give a more local example with which the Deputy is bound to be familiar and it was interesting. I was in Midleton after the flooding and visited the fire station, which was used as a control centre. I spent an hour or so in the control centre and watched the work being done by staff from the various agencies of the State, including the local authority, fire brigade, Met Éireann, various Departments, Garda, etc. My sense is often what one wants is a local co-ordination meeting point where one pulls together all the services and online technologies now give people that ability. Interestingly, we were able to compare notes with different locations on what was happening, etc. Having seen examples like that in operation recently makes me think that it does not always have to be Kildare Street and on the ground is very useful.