Gerry Horkan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

We have covered a lot regarding aviation in this committee over the lifetime of this Dáil and Seanad, and Ireland has such a rich history of aviation that a lot of the world probably does not appreciate that, for example, duty-free as a concept started in Ireland and Irish coffees were invented in Ireland at Shannon, Foynes and so on. Likewise, half of the aeroplanes in the world that are leased are based out of Ireland, and while they may never have flown here, they are owned by entities headquartered and established here, with the expertise in that area that comes with that. I am not sure whether the world recognises that Ireland is responsible for the chief executive of British Airways and until recently the chief executive of Qantas, and for Willie Walsh, who is now in charge of the International Air Transport Association, IATA. There is also, obviously, our own Michael O'Leary and so on. Ireland has a rich aviation history.

We attended a conference in Brussels in May to discuss the decarbonising of the hard-to-decarbonise aviation and maritime sectors. There was a lot of talk from the centre of Europe about how we can all just get trains but the representatives from the Canary Islands and Malta were saying to hold on a second, as were we, while the representatives from northern Sweden were also saying they were not so sure that a train from northern Sweden to Madrid was going to work. In fact, when we were in Seville, we were told the busiest route in Seville Airport is from Seville to Barcelona. It takes about an hour or an hour and a half but it is an 11-hour train journey via Madrid or thereabouts. Maybe it is not 11 hours but we were told it is a long way.

Aviation has its place and is especially important for an island. We would probably all love to get onto a train in Dublin and soon be in Paris or Brussels without having to worry about taking out your liquids and all the other things you have to do at an airport, but it is not a feasible option for us. Sometimes people do not appreciate that Ireland is as isolated as we are. Even though we have amazing connectivity and so on, it is not as easy as jumping into a car and driving across a border in the Schengen area or getting onto a train in Prague and ending up in Vienna, Budapest, Hamburg or whatever.

Perhaps some of that could be brought to people's attention so they can appreciate how well we have done despite the fact that we are quite a remote part of the Continent relative to a lot of the core areas in the middle of Europe. That is one of the disadvantages we have to overcome and we do so on a daily basis.