Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Dillon. As he knows, during the Covid pandemic, I was the Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, then moved into the rural community space. I was absolutely committed to remote working because I could see it was going to change rural Ireland, and it did change it. We asked the Western Development Commission to roll out the connected hubs platform and it has been working hard on that. It has been doing that and working on our behalf. We fund it to do that work. I have to say it is useful. Some of the surveys and findings are very interesting. We are ahead of the curve compared with other countries. The OECD singled us out as being among the best countries for our remote working policy. We have an offering that is probably ahead of many countries. When investors are looking at this country, employers do not have to look at one place. They can look all across the country because we have the network of hubs. Many multinationals use our hubs as spaces for their staff. I have met people who work for multinationals. I was in Abbeyshrule and a few different places. I cannot remember them all. They are working for international companies. Is that not just wonderful? People are living in rural Ireland and contributing to the locality.

With regard to St. Catherine's, I am not sure. Deputy Murnane O'Connor will have to give us more detail. We are not sure on that.

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