Mr. Aebhric McGibney:

Since Covid, Dublin has relied on the counties and areas surrounding it for labour. With flexible and remote working - hybrid working - we have more people coming into the office and the restaurant two to three days a week, which has expanded, if you like, the scope of the labour pool. As we said in our opening statement, we now have pretty much only 20% of people commuting on some days of the week into work in the county of Dublin. That has changed the dynamic in the commercial real estate market. The other dynamic is the change towards more environmentally friendly grade A buildings - modern buildings. Companies want to maintain sustainability so they are looking for better buildings. There will be a huge upgrade of old stock and-or change to apartment use or whatever is going to happen there, but also there remains a demand for good quality grade A buildings.

In terms of the strategies for the competitiveness of SMEs, there is a working group under the Department of enterprise and the Minister, Deputy Peter Burke, that is looking at the cost of doing business. It has a very detailed programme. Some of the issues that are going to be discussed include regulation, the burden of taxation and administration. Insurance was discussed at the last meeting and our next one will be on infrastructure. It is going through all those issues and identifying them. There is a real opportunity for business groups like ourselves, through Chambers Ireland – Cork Chamber and Limerick Chamber are represented – to get to, not confront but challenge, the various agencies that are represented. About 40 State bodies are involved in the group. It is a bit unwieldy, but they need to be there to answer the questions. That is the first thing. That process needs to be undertaken, where we begin to identify how to simplify this SME test, if you like.

In terms of a visitor tax, that issue is not a new one. We worry about its impact in terms of the competitiveness of the location. Dublin is fantastic in terms of air access, so that is always another criterion. On the question about how it would be spent, the city, in particular the city centre, has a real challenge with the multiple agencies that are involved in the delivery. That is outlined by the Dublin task force. The responsibility for implementing and delivering those recommendations does not rely solely on Dublin City Council and Richard Shakespeare. There are lots of other bits to the puzzle. This goes back to a previous point Deputy Gogarty made. It is about the integration of decisions. Dublin Chamber of Commerce has argued for a directly elected mayor, but I will not bring that up today. One of the underlying reasons for that was about the integration of transport, housing and other decisions so that they are integrated at a geographic level. The complexity of Dublin, given its scale, is such that it requires somebody to keep an eye on it. Traditionally, it has often even been a senior Minister, for example. In terms of how the money would be spent, there are lots of things, much of it around security. We welcome the increase in the number of trainee gardaí that have been announced in 2026. That should not come out of a tourist tax. I do not want to conflate the two.