Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party)
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I thank Mr. Saunders and Ms O'Brien for their presentation, which was very interesting, and the more detailed submission, which gave me much more to dig into. I strongly praise the role that the network has played in tackling the pandemic. One of the words used in the submission is "agility" and the service really demonstrated its agility, speed and creativity in its response to the pandemic. It should be praised for how quickly that was rolled out.

I have some questions that might provide the witnesses an opportunity to give some more detail on elements of the submission. The submission recommends reforms of Tús community employment and rural social schemes. What reforms do the witnesses propose? Ms O'Brien spoke about a core costs model. This is not a concept I understand well so I am interested in the witnesses taking time to dig down into that a bit more.

I am interested in hearing how much would make the digital inclusion fund successful? There is an idea about rolling out the local employment service to areas not currently provided for, which makes a huge amount of sense, but I am interested in hearing the detail of how much it would cost, how quickly it could be rolled out and what kind of Government supports would be needed to make that an adequate response. Those are four points and there is much to get through in the time.