Mr. Michael Cawley:

Deputy O'Donovan asked about marketing. The Gathering gave us both lessons and optimism for the future. When budgets are constrained, we must market large sections of the country abroad and then individual communities can take advantage of that. On the one hand the marketing of The Gathering or the Wild Atlantic Way as a concept is the right way to go as I mentioned in my presentation. We get economies of scale by having perhaps three regions - Dublin, the east and the Wild Atlantic Way. We are then focusing all our resources on that in order to get the people in.

The local communities who showed such readiness in The Gathering give me great hope and optimism. Considering the people employed in tourism in Ireland, we have a much higher cost because historically - before The Gathering - we had a low level of voluntary involvement. We need to encourage more voluntary involvement because it helps the community socially as well as from an economic perspective. The Gathering gave us a taste of that. I do not seek to exploit people, but this is a feature, for example, in Scotland where there is a much higher level of voluntary involvement by people in visitor centres and in a variety of other activities that benefit tourism and benefit from tourism. We must cultivate that.

Deputy Griffin spoke about the impact of a tax reduction. It will not surprise committee members to hear that I am a firm believer that Government can produce the environment in which business will thrive, but it is up to individuals to respond to that beneficial environment and not for the Government to fix it. Fáilte Ireland will give its expert analysis based on its research and will give technical help and so on. However, it cannot ultimately coax or encourage people into individual places. There is no better source of that initiative than local people. I live in Wicklow and could pinpoint the need for that in individual parts of our county, which in theory is a very attractive county. However, the way it is presented and the way individual communities take advantage of that varies greatly throughout the county. That is not to say that one has better resources or better attractiveness objectively than another. We need people to engage at a community level. We will be very active in bringing people into the country, producing a package for Tourism Ireland to present abroad but then we need individual communities.

Senator Mooney asked me about engagement locally. As I am new and ironically even though I have considerable experience in tourism, I do not have great experience of Irish tourism because 6% or 7% of Ryanair's business was through Ireland. However, I generally know what is good and what is bad abroad. I want to match that with local knowledge that I hope to acquire over the next six to 12 months by engaging with people locally on whom we depend for ideas. I have some ideas of my own but I would not claim to be an expert who knows how to attract people into every corner of the country.

The Gathering gave us the optimism that that can happen. It gave the engagement of people and an overall call to action that got people back into all parts of the country - very few parts were not affected in some positive way by that. We need to harness that local involvement and the overall global issue to attract people here in the first place.

Deputy O'Donovan mentioned the separation of Shannon Airport from the Dublin Airport Authority, which was one of the best things to happen. I would like it to also happen with Cork Airport because the independence of the airports gives them the opportunity to compete. In Italy, for example, the airports are independent of one another as distinct from Spain where they are owned centrally. The competitiveness of airports in local regions with them making packages attractive for many airlines and not just Ryanair has underpinned sustained tourism growth in Italy over the past ten years. There have been ten years of unbroken tourism growth in that country despite starting from a fairly high base and despite the recession in many of its source markets, such as Germany, United Kingdom etc. It has succeeded in doing that because the airports were active.

We want to see independent airports, as we have with Ireland West and Kerry. Cork Airport is the glaring example of exception to that. Shannon Airport has shown the way and how it can be. Shannon Airport will record double-digit growth this year; it also grew last year and I believe it has the basis for further growth in future years. That would be very important for Deputy O'Donovan's and Deputy Griffin's regions. We know that Shannon Airport is a feeder into Kerry as well as north into Clare and Galway. That is very positive and while I know there are financial issues for Cork Airport with an overhang of debt and so on, I hope that will be a high priority for the Government.

With regard to the relationship between tourism bodies, I worked with both in my previous job and found them very harmonious. In crude terms, it is Fáilte Ireland's job to prepare the product offering which I spoke about earlier and Tourism Ireland's function to market the product on an international stage. They collaborate and I will be seeking to enhance this collaboration where there is no duplication of effort. We can both find out together, through one piece of research, what consumers want. We should not duplicate this work. This work was done collaboratively in the past and I want to see it constantly updated because consumer preferences change.

To answer Deputy Griffin's question, I hope we will return to 2007 levels no later than 12 to 18 months from now. We can aspire to 10 million tourists over the next four to five years and the benefits this would have for the country would be huge. As I stated earlier I would like to see this throughout the regions as well in as traditional tourist areas such as Dublin which, perhaps, has an overconcentration at present. We do not have too much in Dublin but we need to spread it around.

With regard to ensuring savings in VAT are passed on to customers, we must let this to the market to a certain extent. This sounds very passive but I am a firm believer that if we assume there is not a cartel working, which I hope there is not, in tourist destinations that individual restaurants and hotels who are the beneficiaries of this reduction in VAT will compete actively with one another, and when they are full more capacity will come on the market and more employment will be created. With tax reductions the overriding issue is that the Government, with the reduction in VAT and the abolition of the aviation tax, has provided an excellent environment in which growth can occur. I am very confident it will. Competition will force people, not always but over the long term, to pass on the savings because we and they will not get the growth if they do not.

The question on a potential conflict with Ryanair was interesting. One of the advantages, I hope there are a few, that I will bring to the position is I have a very clear understanding of what motivates airlines to initiate services to a particular country, which is if it makes economic sense for them. This is why I would particularly like to see Cork become independent so it can compete. There is a price for providing services to airlines which is a cost input for an airline. It is like staying in one hotel beside another hotel. If British Airways is sitting in London deciding whether to fly a spare aircraft to Venice, Cork or Dublin it will look at the various costs of the airport against the revenue it will receive. Frankly this is one of the reasons Cork passenger numbers have fallen. The revenues which airlines can earn are not sufficient to cover the excessive costs being charged there. I understand this very clearly. It is not just a Ryanair phenomenon; it is a Ryanair phenomenon, but it is also a British Airways and Aer Lingus phenomenon. They are all in a competitive world and make decisions on this basis. I have been a great supporter of Irish tourism in my time with Ryanair. We have had many opportunities to expand throughout the 35 countries in the open skies regime in Europe. We have acted on the basis that if it meant nothing to our shareholders we would always give the bounce of the ball to Irish tourism. Last year we made a commitment that if the aviation tax was abolished we would deliver 1 million passengers to Ireland. We will exceed this in Dublin, Shannon and Ireland West Airport Knock. Unfortunately Kerry and Cork airports will have fewer passengers this year. I hope this will be reversed in the future for the reasons I mentioned earlier. I do not see a conflict.

The question on access by sea is interesting. Fortunately or unfortunately - it is because our aviation industry is so strong - sea access accounts for only 5% or less of all our tourists. I would like to increase all access. I suspect ferry companies - and I have not spoken to the ferry companies but I will - make their decisions on the same basis as airline companies. If it makes economic sense for them they will do it. There is a marine industry which can be promoted with regard to people bringing in their own craft. I am not clear, because I am not an expert on it, what contribution this could possibly make but I will certainly investigate it. We are very rich in marine resources with regard to harbours. Some of the oldest yacht clubs in the world are in this country. We need to build on this and I am sure they will bring big added value to the tourist sector.