Mr. Ian Talbot:

I fully understand and appreciate the Deputy's point. We have seen the same thing with some town chambers not being able to sustain themselves in a volunteer model. We have been very proactively trying to work with local chambers and local government, particularly since Putting People First came through in 2014, to try to get more critical mass in chambers of commerce. Ultimately, most of the chambers around the room would still take the view that independence is very important. It is about trying to get a critical mass. This could be done by county, for example, by establishing county chambers. In some counties there have been mergers, and in others chambers are trying to co-operate much more with one another. In many of our small towns, it is not great for sustainability or for continuation to depend on the volunteer model. Volunteers can get tired and their interest can wane. We take the view that chambers should work together, collaborate and benefit from that extra resource. We very much encourage our chambers to take the national outputs we put together and convert them for local use. Chambers do not have to reinvent the wheel; they can take what we are producing and go to their local authorities and enterprise centres, etc., to try to make progress. Although we think we have made a lot of progress in this regard, we would like to see improvements in some areas of the country.