Mr. Stephen McNally:

I thank Deputy Griffin for his comments. We were delighted to be in Kerry, it was a great event. As the Deputy said, what is important is that it showed the confidence in the industry and the confidence the sector has at the moment. His point on our rate of return versus Scotland is a good one and it is something we measure quite a lot. Given that we are an island, it is harder to get to us. That is the first thing we must remember. Air and ferry access is a big issue. Scotland probably has a bigger advantage in that it has 60-odd million people at its doorstep, from Britain. Much of its return custom comes from that sector and its airports in Glasgow and Edinburgh are well-connected with the rest of the UK. To be fair to the airline numbers, Shannon has been very positive this year and has brought many more people into the country. It has been great and I have seen the spread of business right around the country. Dublin was very good again. Having spoken to Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland, the number of new initiatives even for next year, and the number of new flights coming into both those airports is excellent and it will improve.

If the access does not happen, we all have a problem, because we can do all the selling we like but we cannot get them in. We do benchmark ourselves. The golf industry, for example, measures itself very much against Scotland and that is an area in which we have made good recovery again this year. The Irish Open and the fact that Mr. McIlroy and others are doing so well in golf are helping our product, so that is something we are conscious of.

Leading into the second question, I agreed with Deputy Griffin's remarks about the west-east divide. Ultimately, we are finding that our American tourist numbers are up very strongly and when American tourists visit they tend to spend much more time in the country than other visitors because it is a long way to come. As a consequence, they do not spend as much time in the east as they do in the west and the south, which spreads out tourism much better. Initiatives like the Wild Atlantic Way will stretch the seasons, because the Deputy is right, it is difficult in the depths of winter to convince somebody that they should be going somewhere. We went to the International Trade Fair in Berlin and the Wild Atlantic Way map was in German. There is a very good YouTube video of how they were selling it to their own people. Germany is landlocked - essentially it has little or no coastline - and they were amazed at what we were offering. The hairs stand on the back of one's neck when one realises how well we were producing the maps for the country. I was delighted to see that and members around the country, both in the west and north west, were delighted with the increase in the numbers this year, so it is something we must do.

The winter season is all about offers and the hotel industry has been excellent at doing that. We see hotels this year opening for an extra couple of weeks in winter compared to the year before. Some hotels that do the seasonal close have managed to stay open a bit longer and intend to open up earlier. That is the start of what was said there. It is to stretch the season out and get more people using the hotels. We as an industry have a responsibility there as we can generate that business. There are lots of people in the country who are time rich. They have time on their hands if we can offer the right product. I think we are much better at it. Our own product is very good. The hotels are warm and comfortable, there is a good Irish welcome and guests are well looked after. We get a great deal of repeat business from that. We are very conscious of the fact that seven out of every ten bed nights on this island come from the island itself. If we are not competitive and offering the right deal, we will simply not do the business. It is really important.
The statement today on VAT is very measured. We have been very measured in anything we do or send out on that. We mention constantly that the recovery in tourism is because of the 9% VAT rate. I will read a short part of our statement today which states:

The recovery in tourism has been supported by a number of important measures such as the 9% tourism VAT rate and this has brought us more closely in line with tourism VAT rates in countries that we compete with right across the rest of Europe making us more competitive when marketing Ireland internationally as a tourism destination. As a result, the tourism and hospitality industry has created over 33,000 jobs since 2011.

In anything we send out, we say that constantly. I agree with the Deputy that when those situations occur, we will not be found wanting going forward.