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Ireland’s first ever National Hub Summit

Ireland’s first ever National Hub Summit

Date: 26 Nov 2022

A number of announcements by Minister Humphreys and Minister English

​Minister for Rural and Community Development, Heather Humphreys, made a series of announcements in support of Remote Working at the first ever National Hub Summit held in Athlone, bringing together businesses, hub managers and policy makers, less than 18 months after the launch of the Connected Hubs platform.

As part of a series of announcements made today, Minister Humphreys confirmed:
  • The number of remote working facilities registered with Connectedhubs.ie will pass the 300 mark next week
  • More than 10,000 remote workers will have registered with the platform by the end of the year
  • Each local authority outside of Dublin has been given a special budget to promote their county in order to attract remote workers and mobile talent
  • A new pilot scheme that will match employers and employees to specific hubs will be launched in the New Year
  • The pilot scheme will introduce the concept of ‘anchor tenants’ and the use of Connected Hubs as a ‘second workplace’ for staff
  • More than 5,500 free hot-desk days have been provided in 2022 alone
  • this Voucher Scheme, which provides three free taster days to remote workers, has been extended until the end of the year


Our Rural Future

Our Rural Future is the whole-of-government policy for rural Ireland for the period 2021-2025. It represents a new milestone in the approach to rural development policy for Ireland and adopts a more strategic, ambitious and holistic approach to investing in and maximising opportunities for rural areas.


Connectedhubs.ie

One of the commitments provided in the five-year Our Rural Future policy is to establish a comprehensive and integrated national network of 400 Remote Working Hubs over the lifetime of the policy (to include a central booking platform for Connected Hub user’s).
The online platform connectedhubs.ie was launched in May 2021 with 60 hubs on-boarded to the platform. This has grown substantially and is expected to exceed 300 hubs by end 2022.


National Hub Strategy

The National Hub Strategy will be developed using a whole of government approach. It will be overseen by an Interdepartmental working group chaired by Mary Hurley, Secretary General of DRCD, and include representation from key government departments and state agencies:

•    Department of Rural and Community Development
•    Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment
•    Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications
•    Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media
•    Enterprise Ireland
•    IDA
•    Údaras na Gaeltachta
•    Western Development Commission