Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 24 Feb 1988

Vol. 118 No. 13

Tourist Industry: Motion.

Mr. McGowan

I move:

That Seanad Éireann notes the upturn in the Tourist Industry and expresses support for the restructuring of Bord Fáilte on a regional basis.

I should like to thank the Minister of State at the Department of Tourism and Transport for coming in to the House for this debate. We can accept from the Minister's involvement that he is keenly committed to the development of the tourist industry to its full potential, which is what we are all trying to achieve.

I think it is recognised by all of us that there is an upturn in the tourist industry. I welcome that development. I come from an area where tourism is very important. We are concerned at this stage as to how we should maximise and take full advantage of this improvement in the industry. I am glad to have had the opportunity to put this motion before the Seanad this evening. I hope it will be accepted in the spirit in which I put it down and that the Minister will recognise that it is out of a genuine concern for the tourist industry that the motion comes before the Seanad.

I welcome the introduction of the task force on tourism. That is an additional bonus and, also, a welcome development. I hope that the task force have the support of those who are interested in the development of the industry. In that regard I suggest to the Minister that as far as possible the task force should have an opportunity of meeting with local authorities. Donegal County Council are keenly interested to assist and co-operate with the task force and I ask the Minister to arrange, at an early date, a meeting between the task force and Donegal County Council. I and my colleagues in the local authority in Donegal would welcome such an opportunity and we would offer constructive proposals to develop the tourism industry in that area. I put forward that suggestion to the Minister.

One of the reasons for putting forward the motion is that we recognise the upturn and improvements in the tourist industry. We recognise also that despite all the difficulties now pertaining in the North, there has been an upturn and substantial improvements in the tourism industry there. This is encouragement for us. We are aware of the general improvements in the industry both North and South. The improvements in the industry in the Six Counties have been such that members of the tourist industry there participated in a work shop at the RDS two weeks ago. That is a welcome development because if there are improvements in the industry in the six Counties, which has gone through difficult times up to now for many reasons, this can only add to the overall picture of improvements for tourists who come to the country as a whole. We have long recognised that if we want to develop tourism to its full potential, we have to do it in co-operation with the Northern Ireland Tourist Board. That is recognised in Belfast and I hope it is recognised in the South also.

The motion was put down mainly because some areas have been neglected. There is no question about that. I claim that County Donegal is one of the areas that has been neglected. County Donegal is part of a Donegal-Leitrim-Sligo tourism organisation. I claim that tourism organisations, as they were structured and set up, got minimal finance and there was very little they could do. It is not enough for them to print glossy brochures, attend festivals and see the nice guys. It is a harder job than that because they have to compete with areas in Europe and other parts of the world that have sunshine, facilities and attractions that we in Ireland do not have. Therefore, they will not succeed if the tourism industry is not promoted on an organised basis.

For many years we in County Donegal have complained that we have not got our fair share of the money that is spent nationally on promoting tourism. I want to outline what our greatest grievances are. The budget for tourism development has been in existence for a number of years. Bord Fáilte have given grants for the development of hotels, the provision of rooms with baths and for general improvements in hotel furnishings and fittings. That development stopped when a number of people, largely based in big centres like this city, had developed their hotels fully and had enough bedrooms with bathrooms. We would have some difficulty in believing that the structure of Bord Fáilte is a proper one. We would rather see people who have not got a vested or personal interest in certain areas directing the spending of the funds of Bord Fáilte. That would be the proper structure for Bord Fáilte. Money should not be spent in areas where the benefit will come to those who have already made it in the industry.

In the north west there are many examples of how a lack of funds and lack of input has cost us dearly. A substantial amount of the Bord Fáilte budget for marketing is spent abroad and the benefits from that expenditure abroad largely come back to the areas that already have got the lion's share. I feel that in comparison with areas like Dublin and Shannon and other areas in the south, the north-west has not got its fair share of expenditure. This is an area which is ripe for development and expenditure in that area would produce a vast return and create employment. Therefore, any expenditure on tourism development there would be worthwhile because it would come back to the Exchequer in substantial revenue. I will not labour that point. I have said it many times and it has been said by many other people also.

I hope the upturn in tourism and the appointment of the task force are forerunners to the Government's acceptance that there is a need to restructure Bord Fáilte on a regional basis and that the regions must be strong enough to stand on their own feet and promote the industry on the ground. I want to say to the Minister that if it is necessary to have a health board in a region to promote health care, then it is no less necessary to have a tourism organisation who have a budget in an area also. There is no point in having an agency who distribute brochures and attend festivals. That is not sufficient. It has long been recognised that the regional tourism organisations have no teeth, no budgets and no ability to promote the industry.

Now is the opportune time for areas such as the west and the county I come from to put forward their claim to be part of any restructuring that will come about in the industry. I represent an area where unemployment is very high. As I said before when I spoke on different subjects, there are 20,000 young people in secondary schools in my area. When they leave school about 1,000 of them will find places at third level colleges in County Donegal, another couple of thousand will go to university and a big number of them will have to find jobs in the area. A public representative has an obligation and duty to strive for the development of his area and to help in respect of employment. I believe I am only doing my duty in bringing to the attention of the Minister in charge of tourism the high value of promoting tourism in the West and in County Donegal.

There is tremendous potential for growth in the tourism industry. I have said on many occasions that if we want to provide employment for people tourism offers the best hope. We have a lesser chance of providing employment in agriculture. It is a contracting business and it is very difficult to sustain employment on farms. Tourism will also help the garment industry, the tweed industry and the fishing industry. I appeal to the Minister to accept that there is potential for the development of the tourist industry in rural areas such as Donegal. He should recognise that if we want to provide employment for young people in their own country the tourism industry must be developed.

I find it hard to accept that Bord Fáilte made a decision to close their office in Glasgow. Anybody who comes from the West knows that we have had an emigration problem for years, and not just now, and that most of the people who emigrated from the north-west, especially Donegal, went to Glasgow and other parts of Scotland. The Bord Fáilte representative in Glasgow worked out of the back of a shop. He did not have a big elaborate office. He had no car and when I was on a promotional trip with Donegal people he hired a van to take us around to the tourist agents. He was on first name terms with them. He was a one man show. There was no big expenditure involved in keeping that office open; yet Bord Fáilte are so removed from the position on the ground that they closed down that office.

I do not understand, and I do not think anybody else in the west understands, the thinking in Bord Fáilte on their decision to close the Glasgow office. I venture to say to the Minister that this was the cheapest office to run that Bord Fáilte had. They have many other offices all over the world and some of them are up to embassy standard or used as social centres. That may be very important but I think we are entitled to question the value of those areas of high expenditure. I believe the Minister agrees with what I am saying. He comes from an area like mine and I believe that if he was in my position he would make a more eloquent contribution but his case would not be much different.

Rural areas have suffered serious neglect. I have a number of brochures with me that are distributed in New York. It is fair to say to the Minister that the nearest references to the north-west in any of the brochures are Galway and Dublin. That is an argument that is very easy to prove. It goes beyond any doubt that the area is totally neglected. It is neglected to the point that the tourism agents who sell the country do not consider it worthwhile to name County Donegal or any of the Six Counties in their brochures.

An Cathaoirleach

Senator McGowan, you have made a very good point and it might be helpful to the Minister if you told him what documents you have in your hands.

Mr. McGowan

These are brochures on the Emerald Isle, Scotland and Wales. I will be delighted to give them to the Minister and I will give them to him confidently. Perhaps I have been overdue in giving them to the Minister.

I have no difficulty in highlighting to the Minister how important it is to restructure Bord Fáilte in such a way that the areas with the greatest potential for employment are brought into focus and that some money is spent there, thereby giving a valuable return to the Exchequer and relieving the necessity to pump dole money into rural areas. I hope to live to see the day when the lorryload of money with the Army on every side of it, is stopped going into rural areas. I cringe at the sight of that van because it is destructive for the moral fibre of the areas it goes into. My ambition is that that vanload of money which goes to employment exchanges is stopped. It is not that I think it is not needed. I totally subscribe to the fact that it is needed. Perhaps more is needed because it is an effort to sustain people and keep them alive. However, why do we channel money into that area when we can cure the cancer that is already there? It is abundantly clear to many of us that there must be a recognition of the areas where money can be spent so that people can come off the dole and young boys and girls can be rescued. This is part of what has to be done and I do not see any way of doing it other than by restructuring Bord Fáilte and creating regional organisations who can stand on their feet and promote industry. I do not see any other way of doing it. Any representative who does not recognise that it is essential for him to make a case for his area will be failing in his duty.

I have a copy of a map, which I will also pass on to the Minister, which shows that both sides of the Border are blighted by unemployment to the point that they show up black on the map. Many speakers in their contributions will talk about Cork, Shannon, Galway, Wicklow and Dublin but I believe the North is a good subject to talk about, but a hard one to deliver on. One way to deliver on it is to recognise that the root cause of some of the difficulties there is high unemployment. The areas of Strabane, Omagh and Derry across the river from where I live have the highest unemployment in Europe. Therefore, there must be a special interest shown in that area. There is no point in paying lip service to it and looking for a special debate on it when there is a tragedy or somebody is shot, if that concern goes out the window the day after. People who express concern about that area have to be consistent and recognise that the problem there is basically rooted in the Border problem. Many people make forecasts about what will happen and how long it will take before the troubles in that area are over. They hope that a generation will come along who will forget it all. However, it is very hard to forget about it if you live in that blighted patch which stands out so clearly on the map.

I have numerous reports on the Border area. I would not be able to do justice to the case for that area in one day. In 1983 the European Social and Economic Committee issued a report on Irish Border areas which covered all of the Border from Dundalk to Moville in Donegal. That report was submitted to both the Irish Government and the British Government. Financial experts in Dublin costed the implementation of the recommendations of that document at £800 million. There was no way the Irish Governments had funds to implement those recommendations. Since 1983, that document has been lying either in a wastebasket or is covered in dust. The only people who got anything from that document were the firm of consultants who drew it up. The document covered such a wide area that it was not possible to implement its recommendations. I will give the Minister the page from the economic and social study which was done in 1983 and which highlights the high unemployment in the Border areas. No matter what form of concern Members of this House express about the North I ask them to recognise that a basic cause for some of that unrest is the unemployment in the area.

I appreciate that I must keep to the time. I could cover many other areas but I would like to bring two small points to the Minister's notice. Recently, the Minister for the Marine introduced licence fees for fishing in rivers and lakes. This is the first opportunity I have had to totally support the introduction of those charges on the basis that rod fishing in lakes and rivers had become like a town hall — everybody used it but nobody wanted to lock the door, pay for the light, clean the windows or do the maintenance. That is what fishing in our lakes and rivers had turned into. The people who are catcalling that we should not impose a charge for rod fishing are the very same people who are calling on the Government to spend money on keeping our lakes and rivers free from pollution. That costs money. I recognise that clean lakes and rivers and the fishing industry is a vital part of promoting the tourist industry.

I want to use this occasion to say that I totally support the introduction of charges for rod fishing. However, I think we have done it too late. We were the only country in the world that had free fishing. But free fishing meant that we had less than the best quality fishing. We have a very valuable amenity and we now recognise that we have to take control of it and spend money on it. I do not think those people who have to pay a small free for a rod licence will complain because the fishing and the rivers will be improved. Most people spend money on one thing or another. A packet of cigarettes costs £2 and by comparison £10 or £15 for a fishing licence is very small.

I want to use this opportunity to support the introduction of licensing fees and to encourage the Government to spend more on eliminating pollution. Many of our beaches in the country have qualified for a blue flag, European recognition that a beach is clean and comes up to certain standards. A number of beaches in County Donegal have qualified for the blue flag. I ask the Minister to promote that aspect of tourism development. We should ensure we achieve the highest possible standard of clean and properly cared for beaches and reach the point where all beaches in the country will qualify for a blue flag. That should be our goal, and we should try to achieve it. If we follow these guidelines the tourism industry should contribute in a very substantial way to employment.

I hope the Minister will see fit to restructure Bord Fáilte. I took up this point with the present Director General, Michael McNulty. He said the rent of the glasshouse at Baggot Street Bridge only costs buttons but he missed the point. The fact is that head office is sitting there and there are a number of people who are inward looking, backward looking and who are entrenched in an outdated method of selling the tourism industry.

An Cathaoirleach

Senator McGowan, your time is up.

Mr. McGowan

I appreciate that the Cathaoirleach has been very helpful to me. I hope that tabling this motion highlights the importance of the tourism industry. I hope it focuses some attention on the potential for development of the industry in the area I come from. Let me assure the Minister that the people in my county are very concerned about tourism. They want to play a part. I started by asking for a meeting with the new task force and I will finish by expressing the hope that the Minister can arrange it.

Mr. McMahon

I would cry better tears for Senator McGowan if I did not come from an area such as Tallaght which has the worst unemployment record in Europe. He has made an excellent case for his end of the country and I do not want to take from that. I hope the Minister will have some good news for him in the coming months.

The motion before us gives us an opportunity of reflecting on the tourism industry. Tourism is one of our greatest industries, ranking third in importance as this country's largest generator of foreign earnings and being surpassed only by industry and agriculture. It is an area where there should be broad agreement as to how best the industry can be served and improved.

The Joint Committee on Small Businesses which was set up by the previous Government and sat during the term of that Government — a committee on which I had the honour of serving — carried out an indepth study of many of the problems associated with tourism. There were TDs and Senators of most political opinions and persuasions on that committee. I was impressed by the immense sincere measure of agreement among all committee members on what steps were necessary to attract more foreign visitors to our shores and to encourage more of our own people to spend their holidays in Ireland.

The joint committee carried out a study. They received 15 written submissions from organisations, associations and individuals. They heard public oral evidence from eight companies and organisations involved in the tourism industry. In addition 50 separate interviews were conducted with many businesses involved in that industry. We discussed at length over many hours and a number of lengthy meetings the problems as we saw them. Having done this we issued a report — not a very lengthy one, less than 100 pages — known as the third report of the Joint Committee on Small Businesses, on tourism, catering and leisure. In that report there were many worthwhile recommendations, some of which have been put into operation, others were noted but we have yet to see them being implemented. It would be unreasonable to expect the Government to implement all the recommendations of a committee but it is only reasonable that any Government should give adequate consideration to the recommendations of any Oireachtas joint committee that would have gone to so much trouble and taken so much time to come to its conclusions.

I ask the Minister to look at this report and take whatever steps he can to implement the remaining recommendations. I ask him also to discuss it with Cabinet Ministers so that we would see some of these recommendations taken to the Cabinet table. I hope the Minister will take heed of my request. I would like to see an all-party committee continuously monitoring the tourism trade which is is extremely important in terms of assisting our economic recovery. I ask the Minister to discuss this with his Cabinet colleagues and consider setting up — if we are not going to have the re-introduction of the Joint Committee on Small Businesses — an informal committee of the Oireachtas to monitor the industry continuously, Politics are not involved as has been proven by the members of the various political parties who sat on the Joint Committee on Small Businesses. There was a great measure of agreement. It was a matter of assessing what should be done and then having the will to do it.

A lot of credit has been taken by the present Government for the increase in tourism in the past 12 months. There was an improvement in tourism in 1987. Everybody on all sides of the House and many people outside the House recognise and welcome that but I ask the Government not to spend so much time trying to draw credit for themselves for this upsurge in the industry. Tourism is such that you cannot get improvements overnight. I do not want to take from anything the Government have been doing since they came into office, or from the Minister, Deputy Wilson or the Minister of State. Many other Ministers who do not have special responsibility for tourism have taken many steps with tourism in mind. The industry is such that it gets broad recognition from all Departments.

The year 1986 was a particularly bad year for tourism. This was caused by events outside our control. We have gone over that in this House and, indeed, in the other House. The Chernobyl disaster was one of the main factors which kept the American market away from Europe and, of course, the antics of our illustrious Colonel Gadaffi and the Syrian involvement in events, which we will not go into here.

The Government, no doubt, have been paying attention to this industry. Tourism is our third greatest industry as far as foreign earnings are concerned. The fruits of the efforts they have been making have yet to be witnessed. I sincerely hope we can report at the end of this year an even greater increase in tourism.

One of the main reasons for the increase in tourist traffic in 1987 was, of course, the deregulation of air fares. This is generally recognised by all politicians and those involved in the tourism industry. The licensing of Ryanair in late 1985 brought that about. This has led to an increase in the traffic coming into this country. Who would ever think two or three years ago that one could now get a flight to London for £65? At that time it was over £200. I believe the increase in traffic is due to the reduction in fares.

There is an increase in the American traffic coming into this country. There are many charter flights from America going to London and because it is a cheap skip to Dublin or Shannon many of them are availing of the opportunity to visit this country. We do not have the same attraction or the same volume of traffic into this country that would permit these cheap charter flights to come from the United States. They are coming into London in their thousands every year. I believe we are now getting a percentage of that traffic which we would not have got if there had not been a reduction in air fares or a deregulation of air fares.

However, this has brought its problems. It now appears that the airlines are entering into below cost fares. I hope the Minister has taken account of this and that he will use his efforts to ensure that this kind of trade does not continue. While we all want to get the cheapest fares possible, the fares should be legitimate. Below cost selling should not be carried out by any company because it is stronger than the rest in an effort to knock out the weaker company. I suspect that Aer Lingus are now engaged in an under cost operation. For far too long Aer Lingus had an monopoly, particularly on the London route. Now that other airlines have entered into the field, I do not think Aer Lingus have a right to engage in below cost fares in the hope that their competitors will soon be knocked out. I sincerely hope the Minister will take seriously what is happening in that area and ensure that it does not continue.

I do not share Senator McGowan's view on the Fisheries (No. 2) Act. I am not a fisherman. I did a little fishing when I was going to school because I lived close to the River Dodder. I enjoyed it but did not have the patience to continue. It is very relaxing.

Professor Murphy

Except for the fish.

Mr. McMahon

The trout and coarse fishing rod licensing fee should not have been implemented. Forty pounds for a salmon and trout and coarse fishing licence is a further imposition on tourists, plus the fact that Bord Fáilte have spent £45,000 on literature to be distributed in foreign lands advertising our free fishing. It will be very interesting when some of these foreign fishermen come and find that our brochures are incorrect and they now are required to pay a licence fee of between £20 to £40. It will be interesting to see how the Government will get out of it because certainly I do not believe the fishermen will pay that fee.

Much more could be said on this and, indeed, on many other items. I hope I will have an opportunity at a later stage in a tourism debate in this House to go into many other matters. I welcome the opportunity to say those few words and I hope the Minister will take seriously the remarks made by the Senators in this debate.

Mr. O'Callaghan

At the outset I welcome the Minister and congratulate him on his successful efforts in acquiring additional funds for the Cork-Swansea ferry company which is of particular importance to tourism in the south west. I am aware of the Minister's commitment to the provision of that fund. I would like to put on record our appreciation of his success in that regard.

In preparing my notes I endeavoured to subscribe to the spirit of the motion. It is a commentary on the effectiveness of Bord Fáilte and the desire by many people in the industry to effect a change. As one who spent 15 years as a member of a regional tourism company I would certainly subscribe to the concept that the time is now opportune to seek change. The winds of decentralisation are beginning to blow and an area which needs to be examined is the need to devolve the running of the tourism industry to the regions. In some cases the regions have huge resources invested in tourism and in the development of tourism products.

I come from a region that has 31 per cent of the tourism plant of the entire country located in the counties of Cork and Kerry. There is general agreement that the time to review the activities and the performance of Bord Fáilte has come. I would not indulge in a Bord Fáilte bashing operation because they were a singularly successful State company for many years. What has happened, in effect, is that time has passed them by. The developments in the international market place are such that there is a requirement for any company which represents a national government, as Bord Fáilte do in the foreign marketplaces, to concentrate their entire efforts and to strive with might and main to hold onto the market share and increase it.

We get bland figures from time to time showing that tourism is the fastest growing industry in the world, and so on. The facts of the matter are that we have not been holding our market share even though we have increased the figures. We are losing the percentage of the total world market in tourism which we had in the past because of the huge resources now being poured into the bigger markets such as Germany, France, Italy and the United States by national Governments. I am aware, for example, that the Greek Government spent more last year on television advertising in the United States alone than the entire Bord Fáilte budget for the whole year. They are a relatively new arrival on the American marketplace. It has been an attractive venue for Europeans for many years but their concentration on America is just an example of the kind of difficulty which is confronting Bord Fáilte.

This highlights what the Government now appear to be saying — I subscribe to this point of view — that Bord Fáilte must concentrate exclusively on its international foreign marketing role. Their role is not to be around this country as they appear to be doing, duplicating the business of the regional tourism companies and, quite often, interfering with the legitimate activities of the regional tourism company. In fact, they have contributed to a substantial disillusionment in the industry.

The activities of regional tourism companies have been curtailed because of the cutbacks in funds. This has been evident, not just this year or last year but since the early eighties, to the extent that the regional company I represent have had their staff cut from 32 to 15 in the last couple of years. How one can be expected to operate a tourism service on that basis I do not know. However, there is general agreement that international and domestic tourism require structures which would probably reflect themselves in three different areas: the international level, the exclusive area of activity for Bord Fáilte, the national tourism product which would be a joint involvement for Bord Fáilte and the regional companies and the administration of tourism by regional companies on the ground exclusively on their own.

The regional tourism companies are very well placed with their present structure to bear examination and to bear upgrading of their role in developing the tourism market. Some of the things they could do would be to bring about a more attractive product through stimulating development of new attractions, organising novel and exciting activities and raising the standard of products and facilities generally. That goes without saying. We have been saying it for many years, but the regional tourism companies need to be reorganised. Their funding should be reorganised.

There is a need for a greater degree of input from the industry into the funding of regional tourism in the future. I am aware, for example, in my own region many hotels are not even members of regional tourism companies, they do not subscribe at all. Yet, you have a tourism plant on the ground, a network of offices, personnel orchestrating the activities of tourism associations, printing brochures, providing office services and so on and in themselves channelling many tourists into hotels, guesthouses, public houses and so on. Yet, these people do not even subscribe to the well-being of the companies. There is something obviously very wrong with that and it is an area which needs to be examined. This Minister and the Government at long last have seen that the industry itself — I am in the hotel business professionally — does not contribute enough to the well-being of the regional tourism companies. That needs to be examined quickly.

However, the role of the regional tourism companies will have to be upgraded, there is no doubt about that. The level of interference from Bord Fáilte was very substantial. The level of duplication was bordering on a disgrace in that you had people in regional tourism companies all over this country doing a very good job and people monitoring their activities, doing the very same job in Baggot Street. That needs to be changed very quickly. The role of Bord Fáilte in future will have to be solely in the international arena. By upgrading the regional tourism companies we will make them worthy of the name of regional tourism companies as they were originally intended to be, a kind of liaison group between the industry and the Department of Tourism and Transport and Bord Fáilte. That is not happening at present.

There are many, many areas that can be concentrated on by local tourism groups. This is not being done at present. There is a need to concentrate on operating standards, environmental standards, developing a greater variety of product, cultural, artistic, historical, musical and environmental which are distinctly Irish in most cases. We should develop in conjunction with those activities youth, sport and special interest activities. There is a whole area there that requires constant attention. It cannot be done by a group whose primary role is to market abroad. When Bord Fáilte go abroad to market tourism they need to be satisfied that the groups responsible for the administration of the industry in this country are doing it effectively: at this moment they are not.

We can examine any one of the areas where we claim to be distinct from any other tourist destination on the continent. For example, in the area of the environment itself — I have no doubt that Senator Norris will be touching very significantly on that aspect this evening — as a county council member I am actuely aware of the constant erosion of the environment and the impact it makes on tourists. We should be equally conscious — and we are equally conscious — of the impact it makes on native people but I will confine myself to the impact it makes on tourists.

Local authorities have expressed a desire down through the years to become more and more involved in tourism. I think if they did nothing more than commit themselves to improving their role in the control of the environment and its effect on our towns and cities, and particularly in the countryside, they would make such a huge contribution to tourism that they should never be asked to do any more. Unfortunately, quite often many local authorities see their role as being abroad with Bord Fáilte in Hamburg, Cologne or in Paris. That is where they want to be, but that is not the role for local authorities. Their role is to complement the image that is being generated by marketing or selling this country abroad.

The point has been made here that we cannot compete with places in the sun. We have no desire to compete with them because we have something that is uniquely different. We should preserve it but sometimes I despair that we can when you drive down through scenic routes like the Healy Pass or the Pass of Keimanfiach or the Vee in Waterford and you see cars dumped over the ditches, all over the place, you see unauthorised dumps, houses built in the wrong places, a plethora of signs and signposts, many unauthorised: I could go on for the rest of the night. Yet, local authorities are looking for a role in tourism. That is their statutory role and I say that as one who has been a member of a local authority for the past 15 years. If local authorities want to be involved in tourism, let them address themselves to the environment. We would ask them to do no more. That is particularly important.

There are many other areas in which the regional tourism companies have the expertise on the ground. In their midst there are hoteliers, guesthouse owners, town and country homes, farm guesthouse people, handlers for travel agents and so on. They are the people who have a deep concern that tourism should work in this country and yet they are being curtailed in every possible way by Bord Fáilte, who have curtailed their budget. They have been constrained in many ways and I could go on here for half an hour. As a member of a regional tourism company I am acutely aware of the constraints. Bord Fáilte create so many problems for the operation of regional tourism companies, the fact that they are there at all at this stage is an indication of these people's commitment to the well-being of the industry. There are many things regional tourism companies could be doing.

Another aspect of this business which should be addressed by the Minister is the singular way Bord Fáilte have resisted the expressed desire of regional tourism companies to go abroad in the vanguard of their marketing programmes. I look at Bord Fáilte's marketing programmes as somewhat of a pepper pot nature: they go to Germany and try to convince Germans to come to Ireland because of the beauty of the countryside and so on, but in concert with that particular marketing programme you need people to go from the Cork and Kerry region, from the Donegal region, the mid-west, the Lake-lands to sell their specific package because each region has its own particular differences. This is where we fall down.

We are selling Ireland as a product. We have to be much more specific in future. There are many new areas of development that can be examined. I cited one recently, hill walking. If there is any country in this world for hill walking it must be this country. In the UK alone there are three million registered club hill walkers but we have not even addressed that market yet. There are huge numbers of angling clubs in the UK, France and in Germany and we have not got next or near them yet. Off season, we concern ourselves with the fact that we have a 12 week season in this country.

We have not developed, for example, the shooting industry. I can remember Frank Hall having a great parody about shooting tourists and some guy took him literally and decided that there was a bit of a sideline in shooting tourists. The facts are that there are many areas of opportunity and the day has come when we have to concentrate and focus on where we have strength. We cannot compete with Spain and Portugal. We have very distinct facilities of our own; we have expertise on the ground. This initial step of setting up a task force in the short term is very welcome but I think that in the overall spectrum of the tourism industry, only when the Minister and his Department are examining the redeployment of staff and expertise from Baggot Street, down into the regions, will we get the kind of response that I know is forthcoming from regional tourism companies if they are given their head.

Professor Murphy

There are areas of public debate in which I have a great interest and about which I know a great deal. There are other areas in which I have a great interest and about which I know relatively little. The subject of tonight's debate belongs to the latter category and I am glad to defer to the expertise of people like Senator McGowan and Senator O'Callaghan. But I speak because I share their views — and Senator McGowan and I share relatively few views in common but I think we both agree on the overwhelming importance of the tourist industry — and, as Senator O'Callaghan has suggested there are whole sections of that industry which we have not even begun to tap. He referred to hill-walking, for example, and here I can vouch from personal experience. If I may be provincial I would suggest that areas in the County of Cork must be unparalleled in the whole world of hill-walking. However, I will not push that point.

Senator O'Callaghan referred in passing to the 12 week tourist period, but sectors of the industry like hill-walking are not dependent on the 12 week period. The weather we enjoy at present, for example, is ideal for that kind of industry. We should be pitching the appeal of that, I think, virtually on an all-year-round basis. As one who from time to time spends short terms in the US, and who knows that, come a particular month you can say goodbye to walking for three or four months, I must say that on my return I greatly appreciate our great amenity in that regard here.

In a previous debate I also mentioned the merits of cultural tourism. I think the phrase is beginning to be fashionable now. It has enormous potential. Here again I can speak from personal experience. For several years, I have been running a summer school in Irish studies in University College, Cork, and we have evidence that the reverberations of that are endless. The students who enjoy themselves and go home after a fulfilling experience are messengers of tourism and they send back their relatives and so on and they themselves come back when they are better placed financially later in life. We have only begun to tap a lot of the potential of tourism and I agree with Senator McGowan that properly handled it will be the single greatest contributor to creating employment.

Having said all that, the secondary reason why I am speaking is that I am curious about the motion. I did not quite understand the way in which it was pharsed. For a moment, I thought that Bord Fáilte was being restructured on a regional basis and I made some inquiries before the debate and I found that that was not so at all. Though Senator O'Callaghan addressed himself if more relevantly to the core of the motion than other speakers, even he did not really convince me as to how this balance could be struck — because it is a question of striking a balance between the national and the regional. The people in Bord Fáilte itself, in headquarters, will not agree that there is a need for regionalisation, or at least they will not agree there is a greater need for the present degree of regionalisation. They are not aware of the problem or they will not admit a problem.

I think that it goes without saying that Bord Fáilte has to be there, that its role is clear in some regards, as Senator O'Callaghan pointed out, that it has to market the country nationally. I cannot see regional tourism boards projecting the national image as Bord Fáilte so effectively does. Here I would like to mention the excellence of their publicity journal, Ireland of the Welcomes, which is very favourably spoken about abroad. I think that only a central organisation could make that kind of promotion. On the other hand, as I understand it, the regional tourism boards are becoming financially more self-sufficient. Indeed, on account of the times in which we live, they have had to cut down — they have had their funds cut down — and, as I understand it, there is more self-generation of finance in these local areas. They are doing all kinds of things like selling brochures and indeed there are money-gathering exercises by individual members of the regional tourism boards. If they are increasingly paying the piper, as it were, then it is understandable that they want to call the tune also. I would like to hear more about this. I would like to hear the Government's views about it.

I have no closed mind myself about this matter. For example — to come back to the area which I know best and about which Senator O'Callaghan knows a great deal — it seems to me that if the Cork-Kerry Tourism Board is increasingly more autonomous in fact in terms of finance and so on, then it is only fair that it should be able to operate autonomous marketing as well. Who better than the Cork-Kerry tourism people to know, for example, that the people of the south of England and the people of Wales are the likely people to come to Cork and Kerry? Freedom should be allowed to the regional areas to do that kind of local recruiting. That only makes sense. It should not be beyond our wit to devise some system of values between the central and the regional demands. I believe that the central organisation is somewhat concerned about the independent activities of SFADCo — I do not know whether that is so or not — but I do understand that Bord Fáilte are not altogether happy, perhaps, that certain regional organisations should be demanding this kind of autonomy. It is certainly a matter for the Government to tell us where the balance should be struck.

Like other Senators, I welcome the arrival of the task force on the scene. I hope that the new appointments to Bord Fáilte will be made very quickly for the vacant chairmanship and the managing directorship and I think that would be good for the morale. Finally, I did listen very carefully to Senator McGowan and though I am not intimately acquainted with his part of the country, nonetheless I do accept what he has to say about the fact that it is a particularly deprived area and that the Border does present problems there as well, but the Border also presents opportunities I think.

I was pleased to note that in the news earlier on tonight there was a report on a conference which has just concluded in Enniskillen — a cross-Border conference — in which they are acknowledging on both sides of the Border that they have common interests and that they must market the scenic Border area in common. Here is one of the areas. Incidentally, I think that that conference was sponsored by that excellent organisation, Co-operation North, which does a world of good virtually unheard of and unpublicised work. I am pleased about the symbolism of new beginnings in Enniskillen after the horror of last November. But the conference points up how it is that there can be cross-Border co-operation, there can be creative coming together on both sides of the Border without having recourse to the counter-productive rhetoric about political unification.

I am glad to be able to support the motion. I support the spirit of the motion. I join in welcoming the Minister and I look forward to his comments.

Mr. S. Haughey

First, I would like to say that I very much welcome this debate and thank Senator McGowan for putting down the motion. It is a very timely debate and one which the Government I would imagine would very much welcome at this time given their commitment to boosting the tourism industry this year and in future years. Having said that, I would like to congratulate the Minister for Tourism and his Ministers of State and the Government for the commitment they have given to the tourism industry both last year and this year. It would be fair to say that they seem to believe that tourism certainly has not reached its full potential in this country and they seem to be setting out to rectify that situation. They have come up with a number of initiatives which even to date, have proven successful. I congratulate them and wish them every success. The people of Ireland would certainly be behind them in trying to develop the tourist industry to its full potential. Everybody realises that has not been the position to date.

I hope you will forgive me if I take this opportunity to congratulate Dublin on its millenium, its 1,000th birthday. I do that for a particular reason; I believe 1988 is going to be a very good year for tourism because that celebration is taking place and I hope that as a result of the celebrations many tourists will visit the city from the Continent and other areas and it would then be the responsibility of Bord Fáilte to ensure that once these tourists enter the capital they will then go and explore the rest of the country. That is precisely what Senator McGowan is hoping for by his motion and, hopefully, the tourists, having come to Dublin for its celebrations will then proceed to Donegal, Cork and Longford—and even Tallaght for that matter — and boost the tourism industry right throughout the country.

Everybody accepts that the tourist industry has not been performing as well as it should and it has been said that in Ireland we have a second rate tourist industry. We must a now examine why that is so. Mentioned in Senator McGowan's motion is the whole issue in relation to Bord Fáilte and that now must be looked at in a hard, critical way. The time has come to look at all these institutions and bodies which have served us very well in the past. In a time of changing circumstances, changing economic conditions and changing social circumstances and, given the Government's position in setting out to bring about national recovery and to make Ireland more efficient and more productive, these bodies must now be looked at in a hard, critical way. Bord Fáilte would certainly have to be criticised for not developing the tourist industry as much as possible. There are fine men and women involved in Bord Fáilte and they have done a tremendous job. I think times are changing and we must now look at the board to see if it is serving us well and how can it be improved. In that regard I welcome the setting up of the Tourism Task Force which every other Senator, from what I can gather, has also welcomed. I think they will set about this hard, critical analysis which we now must undertake.

Of importance also is the Price Water-house report on tourism which came out in October 1987. It listed three things which it saw wrong with the tourism industry in Ireland: one, poor marketing, two, unco-ordinated management and three misallocation of resources. Every Senator, to some extent, has dwelt on those three inadequacies and I hope that the Tourism Task Force will now come up with positive proposals under those three major headings. I wish the Members of the Tourism Task Force every success in their job and I welcome those who have been appointed to it. We have hard-headed business people and people from every other element of society included in it. They are very positive and efficient people. They know the job that they have to do and they are determined to make the task force a success. I wish them every success in that regard and I am confident that they will do a good job.

In particular they should look at a number of areas, first access to Ireland. That has been dealt with by Senator McMahon and other Senators. That is the first issue they should deal with how to get tourists into Ireland and how to get them in cheaply. There have been a number of developments in that regard during the last two years and I think we should encourage that even further and come up with strong recommendations to ensure that tourists enter Ireland as cheaply as possible from the continent.

Other Senators have mentioned areas and topics which we could develop further in relation to our tourism industry and the matter of adventure holidays and hill-walking and so forth has been mentioned. This is something that Ireland must now set out about seriously to develop so as to encourage tourism — golfing holidays, fishing holidays, sailing holidays and hill-walking holidays. That whole adventure area has been underdeveloped in Ireland and we should now do everything possible to market the special advantages Ireland has in relation to those areas and encourage people to come into the country.

The other area the task force should look at is the whole area of competitiveness. Everybody would surely agree that Ireland, by way of prices, is not as competitive as it could be. The whole issue of indirect taxation and petrol prices, restaurant prices and so forth should be examined in a hard, critical way with a view to encouraging people to come into the country. There is no doubt that prices and our competitiveness are under question by continental visitors and indeed under question by people within our own country. That must be considered in a hard, critical way also.

In addition, Ireland has a number of other advantages. We have special interests peculiar to Ireland and I am thinking of our national games, GAA and so forth, the All-Ireland hurling final and the football final which are unique to Ireland. Those events could be marketed abroad in a very special way which has not been done to date. Ireland has a very special place for the horse. There are a number of areas there which could be developed — horse racing, showjumping, bloodstock and so on — and which would encourage a special type of person to come here for their holidays. I hope that the Tourism Task Force will bear that in mind.

There is another matter that has been mentioned by various Senators and that is our environment. Up to this we have had a very pleasant, unpolluted environment but it is under threat at present and we must be extremely careful that we do not destroy this unique asset which we have, pollution-free beaches and so forth, and we must be very careful that we do not destroy our environment, that we do not have graffiti on every wall you look at, that we do not have litter all over our beaches and so on. I hope that the Government, the local authorities, and every institution and body in this country will set about ensuring that our environment is protected, so that our tourism industry can be developed to its full potential.

It has been said over the last few months that Ireland has failed to keep pace with the international trend in tourism and that if we had done this we would have earned an extra £500 million in the ten-year period up to 1986. This is a very important statistic and shows how crucial it is that our tourism industry reaches its full potential and is developed to the absolute maximum. We simply must get this industry right and develop it in the way that it should be developed.

I welcome the motion by Senator McGowan. I believe that decentralisation is certainly needed. Tourists have been coming to this country in unprecedented numbers during the last year but they are not getting into all areas of the country. Some areas of the country have been totally missed by tourists from the Continent. Were the Tourism Task Force and the Government to set about implementing what Senator McGowan is suggesting—that decentralisation should be encouraged — I think we could get the tourists into every part of the country, which is not the position at the moment.

I welcome the moves which have been made to date to decentralise our tourism industry. I note that the Shannon Free Airport Development Company has now taken over tourism in the mid-western region. That is a good development and further decentralisation along those lines is to be welcomed.

To conclude, I welcome the motion. It sets out that improvements in the tourism industry have taken place during the last year and it makes suggestions on how the industry can be improved even further in the coming years. We must get it right. I believe we will, and I wish the Tourism Task Force every success in the future.

Mr. Norris

I listened with great interest to what my colleagues in this House have said on this motion. I agree with a great deal of it but I have some reservations about the motion. I agree — and it is being signally recognised by the Taoiseach and the entire Government — that tourism is an extremely important element in the re-energising of the finances of this country. They have also recognised that cultural tourism is a very significant area. It is the most significant potential growth area and I wonder sometimes what we are doing with this. I do not want to attack Bord Fáilte. I have had the privilege of working with them, not just in this country but also in New York.

I may take this opportunity to tell the House that they had in 1982 an exceedingly efficient operation in New York. I was in New York and throughout the United States broadcasting on radio and television trying to persuade people to come over here. That raises a second problem. We were, I might say, quite effective. Subsequently I have developed something of a conscience because one element in this equation that has been noted by Members on all sides of the House is the fact of a product.

This is a marketing exercise and we are marketing a product. Various people are worried about the quality of that product in terms of the environment. I remember very clearly being down at the General Council of County Councils in Ballybunion, County Kerry, and saying at that stage, early in June of last year, that I was concerned about things like bungalow blight, pig slurry spillages, and I was laughed out of the place, but those few of us who spoke on those issues proved sadly to be only too correct.

I would like to narrow my focus to an area that has not been addressed. The Minister will probably only have a moral force in this — I am not sure that he has any direct legislative impact. My colleague, Senator Haughey, I am glad to note, is wearing the millennium tie, and has drawn the attention of the House to the fact that this is the year of the celebration of the thousandth anniversary of the city of Dublin. I am very sad that in my dealings with foreign journalists and people from the tourist industry of other countries, I detect consistently a feeling that civil servants and others involved in the tourist industry either consciously or inconsciously direct people away from the city of Dublin because they are so ashamed of it. Although I see the Minister shaking his head this was said directly to me over the last weekend: I know it to be a fact and I can tell him precisely why. If he cares to consult page 10 of The Irish Times he will see why. I was over there advertising the Dublin of James Joyce, No. 7 Eccles Street, the home of John Francis Byrne, friend of James Joyce, in fiction the home of Leopold Bloom in Joyce's great novel. What has happened to Eccles Street? That house is gone; thanks to the Mater Hospital that entire side of the street is gone.

I would be very interested to hear what the Minister for Tourism has to say about the fate of that entire street, including the fate of the home of Francis Johnson. These are the kind of things people come from America to see. It is under threat. It is under threat because the planning legislation and the interests of tourism of this country are not at all taken into consideration by operations like the Mater Hospital. The House will be aware, of course, that an injunction was granted this morning against the students who are against the destruction of Dublin, and Dublin, the capital city, is a thing that is advertised on all the posters in America: right across them we have the doors of Dublin. Well, my goodness, they will see the doors of Dublin when they get here. One of the most important factors in tourism is return tourism. If we disappoint people in this way, are they going to come back? I am very much afraid that they are not. This really worries me. It worries me that a deliberate attempt should be made by the authorities of the Mater Hospital to circumvent the development plan of the corporation of Dublin.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

I am very slow to interrupt the Senator but in a motion like this the Chair would prefer if the speaker made only passing references to peripheral matters. I do not think the Senator should confine his remarks to housing or any such aspect of it. It would be helpful if the Senator tried to avoid mentioning specific names of institutions or people.

Mr. Norris

With the greatest respect, in the present urgent and emergency situation it is very difficult to avoid mentioning those who are so clearly implicated and continue, regardless of the wishes of the people, regardless of planning legislation, regardless of the Dublin Draft Development Plan, to insist on demolishing our national assets. I am sure that the Minister, who clearly has the good of the tourist industry at heart will use his influence in this area. I shall take the strong hint from the Leas-Chathaoirleach, particularly because I intend speaking on a related matter in the debate on the Adjournment and it would not be my wish to abuse the privileges of this House.

I would like to take the opportunity to congratulate the Minister and his Department as well as Bord Fáilte on what is a growth in tourism but, as my distinguished colleague, Senator O'Callaghan, has quite rightly pointed out, although there is growth on an international scale of calculation, our share of the market is actually dwindling. This, without returning to the contentious issue that I raised is because of a perceived defect in our product. Our product does not reside in the kind of areas that Senator O'Callaghan was talking about, which is good weather and sunny beaches; there is no point in Ireland pretending that it has the kind of climate that will be automatically attractive, although I am very glad to hear that Professor Murphy enjoys hill-walking in this particular climate and obviously finds it an invigorating and robust form of sport.

I welcome very strongly the development of the national task force. For this, I think, there has been an unanimous welcome. We need that kind of entrepreneurial energy in the tourist industry. I congratulate the Government on having had the foresight and imagination to set it up.

I will end with just my little hesitation about the way in which this motion is framed. I would not like to see a kind of negative and destructive rivalry between the regions. While it may well be appropriate to create regional interests and this, of course, has already been done with the creation, for example, of Dublin East Tourism, I am not too worried about SFADCo. They have a remarkable track record of success. If they can do it in the tourist industry, I would be inclined to welcome that, but perhaps I am not sufficiently informed on it. It is perfectly clear to me that, once you go outside this country, there must be a super regional national authority with a coherent, consistent and determined attack on a market which has very very keen competition indeed. I am not at all surprised to have heard this evening of the very large sums of money being expended by other national Governments. I wish the Minister well in his attempts to secure an increase in tourism, an attempt which has the support not only I believe of his Government colleagues but of all the Members of this House and the Irish public.

An Leas-Chathaoirleach

When is it proposed to resume the debate on this motion?

Mr. W. Ryan

Next Wednesday.

Debate adjourned.