Denis Naughten
Question:9. Deputy Denis Naughten asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the steps he is taking to try to secure direct flights from China to Ireland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23231/15]
View answerWednesday, 17 June 2015
Questions (9)
Oral answers (6 contributions)
Almost 110 Chinese tourists per day visited Ireland last year. The number is estimated to grow by one fifth by 2017. Some 120 million Chinese are to travel abroad this year and are to spend a total of approximately $100 billion. Despite this, we do not have any direct flights from China to Ireland. Is it not about time the Government put strategies in place to try to attract direct flights to this country?
The strategies are in place. The Government and its agencies are working very hard to establish direct air services to China to underpin further the growing tourism and trade relations between the two countries.
The House will recall that the Chinese Premier visited Ireland along with a number of other Chinese Ministers in May. In his meeting with Premier Li, the Taoiseach welcomed efforts to improve connectivity between Ireland and China and indicated his desire to see direct flights.
The legal framework for the operation of international air services is laid down in bilateral air transport agreements. Both Ireland and China signed such an agreement in 1998 to facilitate the establishment of direct air services. However, the setting up of such a service is ultimately a commercial decision for the airlines concerned.
There are ongoing contacts between my Department and the Civil Aviation Administration of China. The Irish airports and Tourism Ireland also have attractive incentive and marketing programmes available to help support new services.
Last week, Tourism Ireland led a five-day sales mission to China. A delegation of 14 tourism enterprises from the island of Ireland took part in the targeted travel trade mission in a bid to increase our share of this rapidly growing tourism market. Initiatives such as this help to raise Ireland's profile with the Chinese travel trade and population more generally and I hope that airlines will see the potential demand for services increase as a result and be encouraged to establish new direct routes.
More than 300,000 Chinese tourists visited New Zealand last year. New Zealand has a population pretty much the same as that of Ireland but it is actually farther from China than Ireland. However, there are direct flights.
In light of the strong ties between Shannon Airport and senior political figures in China, should we not now try to build upon that and bring high-spending Chinese tourists to Ireland? On average, each Chinese tourist in New Zealand spends approximately €2,600.
Specifically, what measures are being put in place to make available funds and a marketing budget to attract an airline to fly directly between China and Shannon? This would allow access to the western seaboard and the midlands, where there is considerable potential to develop tourism.
All this work is actively under way already. We are enjoying a growing tourism relationship with China. This is one of the reasons we introduced a new visa programme along with the United Kingdom. Under the programme, a potential visitor to Ireland from China can use the same visa to go to the United Kingdom and vice versa. VisitBritain and Tourism Ireland are working together and are to target long-haul visitors to come to both countries on the same visa. This is the very reason we had a five-day mission last week led by Tourism Ireland. It was to determine how we could generate demand to sustain direct flights between both countries. That is the reason Tourism Ireland has a presence in four Chinese cities, including Shanghai and Beijing. We are doing all this work to generate demand sufficient to sustain a direct service between Ireland and China. As the Deputy will appreciate, I am not in a position to direct a company the State does not own to provide a flight between both countries. However, we are working very hard to establish an environment in which such a service could be launched.
The problem with the visa is that it is a single-entry visa. Therefore, a Chinese visitor who visits Ireland after having visited the United Kingdom cannot return to the United Kingdom before returning home. This anomaly needs to be addressed because it is causing a barrier.
Owing to the very close relationship the Minister now has with IAG, surely he could telephone Willie Walsh and have a chat with him about the possibility of putting flights in place. As the Minister knows, since the exclusive arrangement for US visa preclearance at Shannon may not continue, it will undermine the role of the airport.
There is huge potential to use the political capital that has been built up as an anchor to bring direct flights to Shannon, the midwest region, the west and the midlands. Will the Minister put together a working group composed of the Chinese community here, tourism agencies, his Department and public representatives from the wider catchment area, both Government and Opposition, to see how we can develop and market this as a whole?
All of the work the Deputy calls for is taking place. This is why a mission to China took place last week and why we have had such contact at a senior level between Chinese political figures, Government Ministers and Irish politicians to put in place an arrangement where certain services can be launched. The Deputy knows that for a service to be either launched or maintained, the demand from either tourists or investors has to be there. Through measures like the visa programme, which is proving to be a huge success, and our contact with the Chinese civil aviation authority and the Chinese Government, the Government is putting strong measures in place and working, hopefully, to land such a link in the future. A really important development is taking place this weekend when we will have the first direct access between Ireland and Africa. I know that all of the figures that have been involved in making this happen are working as hard in making the Ireland-China route happen at a point in the future.