Mr. Padraig Cribben:

The Deputy's point is well made with regard to rural pubs and closures and we must consider the potential effect on tourism. In many places, the pub is the only public amenity available. The pub can serve as a meeting point for locals and for tourists or as a stop off point for tourists. Unfortunately, over the last five to seven years we have seen in excess of 1,000 pubs close, most of them in rural Ireland.

The Deputy's point regarding a cross-party forum is also well made and that is something that we are calling for here. The Deputy asked what such a forum would examine. In terms of rural pubs and smaller pubs, a number of initiatives that would help their viability could be considered. One would be raising the VAT threshold, for example. That would certainly help the viability of a lot of those businesses. The issue of rates has been raised by the representatives of the Irish Hotels Federation and in the context of hotels they are quite exorbitant. They are also quite exorbitant at local level too for small businesses. Traditionally, the rates on pubs were determined by the size of the premises. However, the size of pubs in no way matches the commercial activity that is taking place in some of them. Some small rural pubs are liable for rates of between €5,000 and €8,000 per year but would be turning over less than €150,000. The rates bill has gone from being 3% or 4% of turnover to 7% or 8% now. There is no mechanism to get the rates base changed other than a full-blown revaluation in the county concerned. There is allegedly a mechanism but it amounts to giving a local authority €250 to determine whether the business can be re-rated and in 99% of cases, unless what is called a "material change in circumstances", businesses are not re-rated. A 50% drop in income is not considered to be a "material change in circumstances" which I find very hard to understand.

The third issue a cross-party forum could examine is the question of transport. Something that has become a lot more prevalent in recent years, because of the change in the drink-driving laws, is publicans driving people home at night but there is no relief available for that additional cost. Relief is only available in the context of a certain size of mini-bus, the purchase of which would not make any sense for most publicans. The forum could consider VAT or VRT relief on the vehicles used by publicans to drive their customers home. These are the kinds of initiatives that a forum could examine and if implemented, they would certainly significantly improve the viability of many rural pubs.