Mr. Barry Dooley:

There have been disagreements and appeals meetings which the clearance managers do not attend. They offer the alcohol company an appeals committee meeting which I attend as a stand-in. Ms Tania Banotti, the chief executive officer of the IAPI, will also stand in and we have an independent chairman, Mr. Fintan Cooney. We would sit in at an appeals meeting, listen to the issues and comment or approve accordingly. In many cases advertisements made in Europe for pan-European usage and appearing in other markets are not approved for use in Ireland. In most cases those advertisements have to be adapted to suit our code, which is the Advertising Standards Authority of Ireland code. The ASAI code is being updated this year and alcohol is one of the sections that needs to be updated. We will do our level best to ensure it is gold standard in its rules and sections and is updated accordingly.

We are here to promote and defend the reasonable freedom to advertise. We are doing our level best to behave that way. I agree there are some who do not do so because there is always one bad apple, but we try to stop that as best we can. We ask the Government for its support to help us continue to develop those standards as opposed to imposing restrictions.

On the question of what is different about the alcohol market, I am not trying to be smart when I say it is no different from other markets in industry in that it never was nor will be any different because the brands within the alcohol sector are competing for market share. As Dr. Kenny said, the norm is that the market in which they operate is static or in decline, so for some of these brands to grow, they need to win new customers at the expense of other brands.

Deputy Billy Kelleher referred to the multiples, which include SuperValu, Dunnes, Tesco, Spar, Aldi and Lidl. They are supermarkets which spent €68 million last year in comparison with the beer and alcohol brands which spent €26 million. It is significantly larger and I take on board the Deputy's comments about alcohol appearing in some of those advertisements. Aldi and Lidl, for example, are German discounters which have captured 15% of the market. We are all aware of that because the data are published every three months by Kantar and everyone is discussing it. It is said that SuperValu will overtake Tesco. The dynamics within the supermarket sector are no different from the alcohol sector. Without being smart, I suggest the committee looks at tea, at Lyons and Barry's, which are two pillar brands in Ireland which have nothing to do with alcohol but the dynamics within which market are exactly the same. Barry's Tea has a loyal customer base-----