Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The timelines are published but I do not have them with me. It is either the third or fourth quarter this year. This is the first time there has been an attempt to develop a strategy with a number of county LEOs. We will also have the IDA and Enterprise Ireland strategies and we will seek to have a genuine forum in which other stakeholders such as local authorities can engage with us on the development of that strategy. We collate the SWOT analyses for an IDA region and what are the strengths and weaknesses of the region and how we can build them out. That is one part of it but we also examine the enterprise infrastructure, including the network of enterprise centres, LEOs offices and incubators in regional institutes of education, and the assets of the region and seek to build them out.

We do not focus on towns per se; we focus on enterprises and the infrastructure and assets around them. However, as I said in reply to Deputy Tóibín, the LEOs have a broader remit now and they will examine mentoring and other entrepreneurship supports for domestic businesses as well as export-oriented businesses. It is region-focused rather than town-focused.

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