Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 29 May 2019

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport

All-Ireland Cruise Ship Action Group: Discussion

Mr. Lorcan O'Connor:

Returning to the original point, we said that Dublin Port grew this business from nothing. It recognised at that time of recession that there was not much freight and that cruise ships were an area of growth from which it could make money. It also had space to do so. We believe business and retail are at the top of the economic curve. Given that freight is determined by need in the economy, our worry is that when we hit the next recession and find that we do not need as much space for freight as we thought we would, we will at that stage have told the cruise companies they were not welcome and we no longer wanted them. If we ask them to remember us and say we would love to have their business back, the concern is that they will say they are sorry but they have moved on to somewhere else. In that scenario, it would take us years to get back to where we are now.

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