Mr. Niall Gibbons:

The Deputy made several points there. First he inquired whether we can keep growing at this pace. We have to be very mindful of the fact that we have seen rapid growth in the past seven or eight years but we face sustainability issues in certain parts of the country. We have to be careful to pursue much more balanced growth. Our emphasis is shifting to regional spread, particularly outside of the tourist season. We are launching a new campaign in 2019 which will have a much more sustainable focus in driving those priorities. The first part of the campaign begins shooting next Monday. It focuses on the northern half of the island of Ireland because that is where the growth opportunities are.

In regard to Great Britain, one of the reasons the Deputy will not have seen as much promotional material as he would expect or like in places like Liverpool and Manchester is that our budget in Britain has been sharply reduced from what it was in 2012. Visibility is not what it used to be. We are delighted to see that the Minister has granted additional funds to Tourism Ireland in 2019, so there will be more of that. We have to be very careful to focus where investment goes in Britain. A campaign focusing on the wonders of the Wild Atlantic Way was directed at places like Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester, Birmingham and Edinburgh this year. It focused on the West of Ireland Airport. It is all about Derry, Knock, Shannon, Kerry and Cork. Again, this is region to region promotion. We will keep on doing that because it is very important.

Our emphasis is on promoting Ireland overseas, so I cannot give the Deputy a direct answer. It is a very good idea. I do not see why all the relevant local history could not be collated in one place on a mobile app. I am not sure where that stands at the moment, but I can find out and talk to colleagues in my office about it. I have met colleagues working on Narrow Water bridge. As new assets come on-stream new tourism possibilities are opened up. We are more than happy to promote those. Our international publicity programme is very effective, particularly when new things are coming on-stream. We have 22,000 international media on our database and we send them out regular news updates. We invite them on tailored programmes where there are new stories. If that happens, we will be very happy to include it.

The industry has already expressed disappointment with the VAT rate returning from 9% to 13.5% because it will take €460 million out of the industry. The rural community is much more concerned about it, as is the restaurant sector. My job is promoting Ireland abroad. We have good air access coming on-stream this winter and next year, so there are possibilities for growth. There has been an increase in our budget and we will give it our best. It is really important that we all work together. One thing we learned during the recession is that projects like the Wild Atlantic Way and Ireland's Ancient East are not just about the marketing of those regions. They are about getting communities to work together to create a great experience for people when they come. They have met with a fantastic reaction abroad, and we will keep doing that in 2019 and beyond.