I refer to your letter to our Chief Executive, 20 October 1999, and our subsequent telephone conversation this afternoon.

  Strabane District Council has never benefited from inward investment despite the fact that we have had consistently the highest unemployment in Northern Ireland. The entire district is also designated as TSN.

  Obviously the Council is keen to see inward investment to assist our economy. The IDB built a £800,000 advance factory and developed 20 acres of an Industrial Estate in 1996. To date the only development on the Industrial Estate was our new local Enterprise Agency. Prior to the construction of the advance factory, the IDB quoted no visitors or potential investors to Strabane. They then quoted 13 visits in 1997. The Council has always taken a defensive attitude to IDB's lack of success in Strabane. A recent meeting with our Council Chairman, Chief Executive and Economic Development Officer and the Chief Executive of the IDB and his Council Liaison Officer was particularly positive. It was agreed that the Council and the IDB would work closely together to target an ICT inward investor for Strabane. A further meeting between Officers of both organisations decided that some form of skills audit should be carried out to give Strabane a unique selling product.

7 December 1999