Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

To reply to Senator Heffernan's question, there will be a local autonomy. There will be a local loan assessment board which will not have councillors on it but will be independent, much like the existing one. It will have grant giving powers but it will be under a service level agreement with Enterprise Ireland. It is delegated autonomy within an agreement, and that is the right way to move.

There will be a new support for enterprises which do not export. There will also be a keenness to get companies which do not export to export for the first time but we believe that under this new structure, in which Enterprise Ireland and the local enterprise office will be seamlessly connected, there will not be the gaps to which the Senator referred.

I understand the point made by Senator Conway. It does not fall within my area but the Ahead programme is about supporting people with a disability to get access to placement programmes, funding and so on. I will take up that matter with the Minister responsible to determine if that funding line is at risk.

In response to Senator Michael D'Arcy's, there is not a rigid gateways and hubs strategy being pursued by IDA Ireland. It is a case of what companies want and the fit we can achieve. Regions must recognise that 92% of employment in regions is not through foreign direct investment, FDI. A total of 8% is FDI but FDI has specific needs and it is different from many of the needs of the other 92%. The first issue is whether we can win the project for Ireland, which is often the hardest one. It is then the case that issues like the depth of labour pools are often strong. That is the reason gateways and hubs come into play because connections with third level institutions become very important in terms of the confidence a company has. However, companies coming here for the first time will often hire consultants who give them rankings of different areas, and that fixes their mind, whereas companies already established here can look more benignly on other regions. The PayPal decision to go to Dundalk was an interesting example of a company with a Dublin base moving to a BMW region. We are seeking to get the regional spread but it is not as simple as moving pawns around on the board because the company's needs are often very specific.