Mr. Eoghan O'Mara Walsh:

That is an estimate that the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation has come up with. We look at it every few months and we recalibrated it relatively recently. It is actually overseas tourist numbers to Ireland that we estimate will not have recovered to 2019 levels, which was the previous peak, until about 2026, hopefully sooner, but I still think there are about three or four years to go. What we are seeing this year is very strong demand for a variety of reasons. One is pent-up demand in that, post-Covid, people just want to get out there and enjoy their holiday experience. Another is deferred demand, given there was an awful lot of business on the books in, say, 2020 and 2021 that ended up being transferred into this year. In addition, obviously, there are a lot of consumer savings as a result of Covid. If we like, we are seeing an artificial level of demand this year. We also have to remember that supply of hotel rooms in Dublin, for example, is down 15% to 17% for a variety of reasons. Next year, 2023, is going to be much softer and much more difficult because all of that pent-up demand and deferred demand will not be there and, literally, the clock will go back to zero on 1 January and we are going to have to win all of the business again. In terms of overseas tourism recovery, it is three to four years away.

Incumbent on that is Ireland remaining a really attractive holiday destination, one that offers really good experiences and really good value for money. Given this idea of late-availability, high-priced rooms in Dublin, we have to make sure that we do not lose the bigger picture, which is jobs right around the country. Tourism is the biggest regional employer and Deputy Griffin mentioned that one in six jobs in Killarney is tourism-related. We cannot damage the industry with short-term approaches, and that applies to both hoteliers, who should not be adopting a short-term approach, and the legislative bodies.