Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

As regards Deputy Howlin's question, I said that I would not introduce a maximum prices order because the experience in the past was that everybody goes to the maximum and feels that is the allowable threshold or acceptable rate. I made the point that hotels charge more for busy weekends and airlines charge more for tickets at such times. Generally, businesses tend to scale their activities to suit demand and, while we may not like that, it is the reality. In this case, the Director of Consumer Affairs undertook an investigative survey and put it into the public domain. Hopefully, that will succeed in frightening people into not doing this again. Whatever about airlines and hotel rooms which often have empty spaces during slack times when people are not travelling, pubs tend to do good business all year round. The name and shame approach is probably the most effective way of dealing with this, rather than by legislation.

As regards Deputy O'Dowd's question, I do not think the Director of Consumer Affairs could get involved in saying "X" is good and "Y" is bad.

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