Ms Amanda Cupples:

Interestingly, Scotland has just delayed the implementation of its legislation because it is quite burdensome and, particularly in urban areas, extremely strict. There is also the linkage between planning and licensing. In Scotland, the legislation has been delayed for six months, partially over concerns that Edinburgh would not be able to adequately host the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August given the importance of affordable accommodation for that group of guests. That is a good example of a lot of the themes we have talked about today, albeit in more of an urban setting, although the highlands of Scotland have similar issues to some of the things we have talked about. We would be very happy to come back and share some of our experiences of going through the Scottish process. It is a good reminder about the need to really be thoughtful - and this goes to Mr. Nolan's point - about what you want to achieve in getting that balance right as opposed to drawing big, red lines around swathes of accommodation because there are unintended consequences such as increased prices increase, which is a problem. You want a new generation to fall in love with Ireland in the same way as other people have, so it is really important for young people to have value-for-money options. You want to be able to host major events and not have to build lots of hotels because it is uneconomical and unsustainable to do that from an environmental perspective. You want to enable ordinary everyday people to continue to earn that income and to make ends meet and, ironically, that means sometimes enabling visitors to stay in their principal residence. You want all those things to be preserved and you do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. For me, it speaks to the critical need, which we talked about, to get that evidence-base via a registration system that is done right, to think about it and to think about what actions must be taken but do them in a way that will solve the problem.

We are very happy to send to the committee a follow-up on Europe and to talk about our experiences. We do this all over the world every day and we are very happy to share what we have learned.