Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

A number of points were made about the Department, that it needed to be more motivated and out selling. We are developing our new strategy. There is a requirement to develop it in the six months of the life of the Government. There is a recognition internally that the Department has not been boxing above its weight and that it needs to do so.

I agree with Senators on most of the issues raised. I should devote some time to dealing with the situation in Waterford. We have discussed the issues raised by Senators Cummins and Cullinane. The idea of upping the 30-day notice requirement with a new regulation has been mooted, but that is not really the way IDA Ireland has dealt with overseas companies. It has not been built on the setting of many regulations with which companies need to comply, rather it has been done by developing a relationship whereby there is normally a long advance notice requirement and a proper planning process. IDA Ireland is given a chance to give its best shot if a commercial decision is taken to find alternative buyers. On the back of experience, bad and all as it has been, I would not recommend that we walk away from this model which has stood IDA Ireland in good stead. It is regarded as being very professional. People do not co-operate with it because of some list of obligations set out in grant conditions, but rather because that is the way they do business. I do not want to get into adopting a different approach.

I acknowledge what the two Senators said about Strategy Waterford and that it has not delivered. I have included specifically a reassessment of what has happened with the strategy as part of this process. There are many things previous Governments did not do. We have to build on what we can do, having looked at the tangible initiatives we can take. I thank people for their contributions.

The need for a university or a technological university has been raised. The programme for Government is very clear on the issue. We want to explore the notion of establishing a technological university which it is believed would add significantly if developed. I do not have the criteria to hand, but I understand they have been developed and that there is a consultative process ongoing. From an IDA Ireland or Enterprise Ireland perspective, we are talking about having the right skills and the right research clusters in place. To be fair to WIT, it has been doing this. It is upping its software engineering courses. It has significant clusters of strengths in the areas of advanced materials, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals and so on. It is doing the right things, but perhaps more needs to be done, or we need to market them more effectively to companies which can match them.

There is another process dealing with the education element but not in my Department. I want to work with the elements to be found in my area. We will be sitting down with WIT and Waterford City Council to see what is being offered.

Is it being effectively marketed? Are there weaknesses in it and how do we address them?

I would be interested in an ideas summit, an issue raised by Senator Quinn, and have heard that such a programme is being developed. We need to encourage such local inspiration. I will, on foot of the Senator's comments, examine whether we can lend support to any such initiative.

A couple of Senators asked whether local authorities should have more control of enterprise agencies. It is important to have a clear enterprise strategy driven from the Department. I want to ensure there is a local point of contact and coherent access to whatever level of support or ambition enterprises may have. Criticism has been made that companies which hit a ceiling with the county enterprise boards are finding that the bottom rung of the Enterprise Ireland ladder is out of reach. I do not want to see such a gap. While local accountability is good and I am fully in favour of State agencies being accountable at local level, creating new structures or replicating bureaucratic structures across every local authority would not be a good route to take.

Senator van Turnhout specifically suggested providing a form of tax incentive for companies which place Irish people overseas. I presume this would take place in the context of an export drive. Enterprise Ireland supports graduate placement overseas and matches graduates with companies, although this is a direct rather than tax driven support. While there may be scope for movement in this area, I am not sure about taking the tax route. Tax breaks are correctly viewed as being a less visible way of giving a subsidy. Some of the tax breaks we provided for worthy things ended up being exploited for unintended purposes. I am, therefore, a little wary of tax breaks and believe we should, as they say, do this above the line. If there is a worthy marketing effort, we should seek to support it. However, I am not ruling out the Senator's proposal.

Senator Harte raised the issue of credit and asked whether the Credit Review Office, CRO, could start the review process before a business submitted an application to a bank. This is not a credible proposal as the office is not a large bureaucracy but a one man band which contracts a series of individuals, on an hourly basis, to deal with cases. I do not know how many thousands of people Bank of Ireland and Allied Irish Banks employ. The head of the Credit Review Office is trying to create standards and establish protocols and ways of doing things, which is also what the Department of Finance wants to do. The CRO website includes advice on how to submit a bank application to ensure the relevant bank is forced to respond in a manner that can be appealed. This the route to take.

Senator Harte also correctly noted that demand for credit was not measured. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, is doing an exercise in respect of Allied Irish Banks to obtain a broader measure of the number of requests being submitted. This figure is not trapped statistically at present. The Senator will, I am sure, be interested in the outcome of this exercise.

I am not doing justice to Senators, but I will try to respond to any further queries they may have.