Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

Yes there are, but they do recognise that there are better ways to set up the procurement competition so that we get true competition and small and medium enterprises are not prohibited from competing. Let us take a printing example and a contract for ballot papers for a general election.

They can break it down into a number of printing contracts so it is not one national contract for all constituencies. Similarly, with Galway and Roscommon Education and Training Board, for example, it does not make sense that they would have to procure everything from a national competition. There should be regional delivery because a lot of the demand is going to be local. There are challenges there. It is important that everybody has an opportunity to compete. One needs to look at the conditions that are applied in a competition that can perhaps rule out certain suppliers, for instance if one sets too high a threshold for turnover level a business has to have or the track record of the business. There are protections that come from that, because one knows that somebody is established and not a fly-by-night operation but one does not want to rule out legitimate competition that could actually deliver better value for money.