Deirdre Clune (Fine Gael)
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I apologise for not being here at the beginning but I had to attend another meeting. I read the overview beforehand and I thank the delegation for the report.

Mr. Peter Davitt has attended here before and we had a lot of discussions on that occasion. He spoke about the survey at the time and it is important to discuss it now. Previously the committee held a meeting with Mr. Sean O'Driscoll from Glen Dimplex. We discussed what happens in Germany and how to resolve the problem that Ireland does not make anything any more.

I listened to the earlier discussion. As the delegation will know, the Government has an ICT action plan which is just as it says on the tin. The graduate conversion programme has grabbed the main headline but a lot is also being done in education. Can the delegation comment on the action plan and whether it is beneficial?

I agree that third level IT courses are academic in nature and put people off. Third level institutes, institutes of technology, university associations and the third level sector have attended here and there was talk of developing a direct liaison with industry. I was surprised that direct liaising has only taken place in the past 12 months. One would think that it should have always existed when developing courses. Can the delegation comment on those few points?