Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Cullinane is quite correct in the question he has raised and it is a very valid point. In fairness to the last Government, the jobs forum was one of the very good things it did. The forum was effective and up to recently some 135,000 extra jobs were created in the State. There are black spots that remain to be examined at Government level. There are other agencies that also need to start looking at these jobs black spots. This was one reason for setting up the Western Development Commission. We are trying to achieve balanced regional development, to get people to come in to the west, the south and the north regions.

The Deputy was correct when he said that while there is major employment in Dublin the regions do not have the same chances. This is why the Western Development Commission was set up. While it is not my Department the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation did a good job with regard to the jobs forum. A Cabinet sub-committee was formed which met on a regular basis and it certainly got the jobs. However, we now want to see balanced development happening in the regions. We do not want all the jobs to go to one particular area. We want to see them in the south, east, west and north regions.

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