Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

Now that we have the property, many more people will be willing to relocate to Limerick. The concept of DCI or the DCD going to Limerick is important. At a conference in Dublin some months ago, Mr. Richard Manning, who was the chair of the development assistance committee of the OECD, was asked this very question as to his attitude to the proposal to decentralise to Limerick. His reply was very interesting.

He said, regarding decentralisation, that he was reluctant to get involved in a local issue. However, he wished to relate a story from the UK. In 1991, his organisation had set up an office in Bangladesh to run its programme there. To make it financially possible — he was the director for Asia at the time — he moved all staff in London who dealt with Bangladesh to that country. Parliamentary questions regarding the Bangladesh programme were dealt with by the unit in Dhaka, and it worked very well.

He went on to say that he personally believed that with modern technology and plenty of coming and going, almost any situation was possible. He said that what we faced in Ireland was a transitional problem of how we wanted to get there. There was clearly an issue for staff used to living in a particular part of the country who did not want to move. They had the same problem in the UK when they set up an office in Scotland.

Deputy Allen wants me to stop, but the truth is sometimes bitter.

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