Mr. Michael Cawley:

We have complete responsibility for domestic tourism. We produce the product to support accommodation providers, restaurants, activity providers, and so on. We also invest in experiences and sites such as Kylemore Abbey, where I was the other day, and create brands like the Wild Atlantic Way and Ireland's Ancient East, which we market domestically. Demand is a function of economic growth and of our ability. We have got much better at this recently and that is why our domestic tourism revenue has grown by 26% in the last five years. We provide customers with what they want rather than what we want them to have. For example, mid-week breaks and weekend breaks for young parents with young children, centred around hotels with swimming pools and leisure centres, have become a big feature. We have gradually helped providers by telling them what a particular customer cohort is looking for. Our role is essentially to research the market, both domestically and internationally, and tell accommodation providers, restaurant owners and activity owners what they need to provide for customers, and we have fine-tuned that product offering over the years.

Weddings are a big competitor in growing domestic tourism. For many hotels, particularly rural, non-urban, non-Dublin ones, wedding business is very attractive. Rather unreasonably, they want tourists to only come in the middle of the week when they have no weddings on. We are trying to develop a portfolio approach for these hotels, whereby they can see the importance of tourists who might stay from Tuesday to Thursday, in addition to the weekend, rather than having an absolute wedding focus. That has been a big issue for us, and we have helped drive growth by getting hotels to lessen their reliance on weddings. More people are having self-catering weddings as well, where they hire houses and bring in their own catering etc. That is good for tourism because we have had a capacity problem in certain areas. Hotels might be solidly booked on the weekends but would have no business in the middle of the week and would not see the relationship between the two facts. That has been one of the key issues for us, as well as developing activities for children and families. Older retirees will also stay at hotels in the fallow periods, either during the week or off-season.

We talked earlier, before the Deputy came in, about lengthening the tourism season. We no longer give grant aid to any activities in the peak season, including festivals and other activities. We will heavily support and discriminate in favour of any event which has a regional focus or extends the season. Everyone is busy in July and August, and we need to spread that out. Similarly, everyone is busy in Dublin for eight or nine months of the year and we need to spread that out regionally.

I will also respond to the Deputy's earlier question to Ms Hynes. I was previously in the aviation business, as the Deputy knows. I suggest he looks at the performance of Cork Airport, which has been allied to Dublin for the past five years. Its passenger numbers have declined every year, with the exception of last year. Breaking from Dublin was one of the best things that ever happened to Shannon Airport, in my experience, and reunification would not be for the best. I also think Cork should be an independent airport.