It will undoubtedly require investment. One should also agree with those colleagues who have suggested that a measured approach is needed whereby we should be able, in particular, to disentangle the differing needs and interests in different industrial or political contexts within the trade union community. Nobody here pretends that there are universal recipes or readymade answers to all questions. We all are aware that progress is not all smooth and there are many pitfalls and difficulties. It is also true that inflated expectations of how the technology would transform working practices are dashed when others continue to behave exactly as they always have, too defensive to accept change.
Nobody says that it is going to be easy.
On the contrary, there is a host of problems to be solved. For example, there are language problems across borders. We must also ensure that we do not exclude from access to information those who will probably never have the resources to be on-line. Nobody would either claim that modern telecommunications can remove all obstacles. As a new and potentially powerful element of our activity, networking may only facilitate our quest for solutions.