Mary White (Fianna Fail)

The Senator should put pressure on his county manager, etc. His suggestion about the storage of electronic voting machines seems alien to me. While there is no harm in saving money on the storage of such equipment, it would be better if we got new industry. While I do not criticise any current employees of IDA Ireland and Enterprise Ireland, they need to become missionaries and zealots.

Yesterday, Senator Quinn suggested that the IDA used to sell Ireland as a low-cost country. I spoke to him afterwards and he accepted that this was not the case. It was never sold as a low-cost country because we were never a low-cost country. At all times when we were seeking international investments, the IDA sold Ireland as a high quality location with a large supply of highly qualified young people. Ireland was never a low-cost country. When trying to attract international investment we always had many low-cost country competitors.

I wish the Minister well in his job. There are pockets around the country where businesses are no longer competitive, for example, Waterford Crystal. We spoke of a place the name of which escapes me.