Mr. Fintan O'Brien:

There are a couple of points to respond to there. We have not directly engaged with Uisce Éireann. We have taken the approach to date that, under existing policy, we would engage via the Department on actions to be delivered on water, and we have taken that approach for the new one. We are engaging quite widely, though, and we have either met or are scheduled to meet some of the other bodies the Deputy mentioned.

We had good engagement with the local authority City and County Management Association committee on rural development during the summer. I cannot remember the exact date. As a Department we also have a quarterly meeting with the CCMA where we discuss shared priorities. It is a key delivery partner for us and we try to keep in touch with it as much as possible. I know it will be having a national forum in November and we are slated to go to that. More generally, we would be in contact with the local authorities on an ongoing basis across our schemes and policies. As I have said, they are key for us.

We are also due to meet the regional assemblies in November to get their views. One of the things we talk about quite a lot is balanced regional development. The regional assemblies are at the core of this to understand their perspective and understand where the various regions see the priorities and the challenges. This will be very useful engagement for us also. We are also meeting the Western Development Commission in the coming weeks. It has a particular role in the region it serves also.

That leads me to one of the things the OECD mentioned when it came over with a number of international experts, both academic and OECD-based, and they were looking at our system. They were struck by how many different layers there are between central government, local authorities, the local development companies which do an unbelievable amount of work on the ground, and regional assemblies. It took them a while to get their heads around these layers and where they all fit together. This is something we are thinking about ourselves, in terms of clarifying that environment in which rural development policy works.

With regard to Local Link, I do not really know how those routes are chosen. When Deputy McGuinness mentions top-down, certainly one of the principles we would see in relation to rural development is place-based idea. It is not possible from our offices in Dublin and Ballina for us to design schemes that suit every single rural area. Many of our schemes, be they LEADER or some of our more nationally funded schemes, are based on this idea of local consultation and local authorities engaging with communities. This is how we deliver value for money and how we get schemes and initiatives that impact what people on the ground want. This principle is very much at the forefront of our thinking.