Capital calling

STRATEGY:To keep Dublin globally competitive, should we be basing all development around the city?

Two recent reports have reopened the debate about whether development should be concentrated around the greater Dublin region or spread nationally, as the National Spatial Strategy recommends.

The first report was produced by Dublin Chamber of Commerce (DCC) and calls for a series of tax, education and infrastructure initiatives to make the capital more competitive and allow it attain the critical mass of fourth-level researchers and high-tech companies to develop into a "knowledge city region".

Martin Murphy, managing director of HP Ireland, and chair of the committee that wrote the report, says the focus was international, rather than national.

"There is obviously a conflict with the spatial strategy, but there is an immediate need to build Dublin into a knowledge city. We are not saying Dublin is going to compete with other Irish cities or detract from them. We are looking internationally and only the capital has the potential, in terms of resources, skills, people and infrastructure, to develop as an internationally competitive knowledge city," he says.

International trends are moving in a direction where increasingly it will be city regions, rather than countries, competing for investment capital and the most talented staff, says Murphy.

Cities such as Singapore, Zurich and Boston were thriving on the back of similar initiatives, he says, and he believes that Dublin must develop quickly or be left behind.

He notes that a second recently published report, this time from the Futures Academy at Dublin Institute of Technology, supports the Chamber view in recommending that resources be concentrated along the eastern seaboard.

This study also suggests that the balanced regional growth envisaged in the spatial strategy may never happen because population growth will be concentrated in the east. Fighting this trend could be counter-productive, the DIT report found.

Liam Connellan is a former chairman of the Irish Academy of Engineering and chaired its committee that produced a spatial development study in 2000. He is well-versed in the Dublin-centric versus national development debate. "When we put together our report, we looked at a situation where people would not have to travel more than one hour, or 65km, to work. That was what we were trying to achieve.

"Our analysis was on an all-island basis and it led us to suggest 15 population centres - 11 in the Republic and four in the North. This is very similar to what the spatial strategy calls for," says Connellan.

The reason it is Dublin Chamber rather than a Government department or semi-state agency raising these issues is in part because the Government has committed to implementing the spatial strategy and also, according to Murphy, because it has dropped the "knowledge-economy" ball.

"When was the last time you heard a senior politician talk about the importance of Dublin, or Ireland, as an information society?" Murphy says the most immediate problem to be addressed is the long-acknowledged weakness in the availability and quality of the capital's communications networks.

"What has to happen as a matter of urgency is that the Government has to decide on what its strategy is on its next generation networks. That's a critical point," says Murphy.

"That can't happen fast enough and needs to happen in the next three to six months," he says.

A spokeswoman for the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources Eamon Ryan said a policy paper on the role of the State in the development of next generation broadband would be published shortly.

She said the Minister acknowledges the "critically important role of ICT infrastructure not just of Dublin, but nationwide".

Other Chamber recommendations include the provision of Wi-Fi on public transport; targeted tax incentives and grants and training schemes to help companies recruit and retain key workers.

Murphy stresses that many of the recommendations have already been implemented in other cities.

For the strategy's recommendations to be implemented, Murphy believes it must be state-led, preferably by the Taoiseach and a Cabinet sub-committee and he says meetings are planned with a number of secretaries generals.

Mark Fielding, chief executive, with ISME said that aside from the Dublin versus national debate, there is little in the Chamber report that is new. "There is nothing new in the plan other than the localisation of the plan to Dublin," he said.

He also argues that it would be better to lobby for a "joined-up integrated ticketing system for Dublin rather than having Wi-Fi transport for the few who might use it."