Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

The Deputy raised three important issues. With regard to visas, people can travel from a vast number of countries without needing a visa but countries such as India and China have the potential to send many visitors to Ireland. When people travel from those countries, they tend to spend a great deal of time in the country and a great deal of money, particularly in the regions, because if they travel this far, they want to see the country. I have written to the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform about the visa issue because it must be examined from the point of view of visitors who may have no connection to the country entering the State and, in particular, from the point of view of issuing North-South joint visas, which was raised in the House this week. I have addressed this because it is important. The Taoiseach when addressing the Irish Hotels Federation conference recently highlighted this issue and he said he would take an interest in it. The former Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, visited China and India to promote the idea of students travelling to Ireland to be educated. This could result in their families and so on coming to Ireland to visit them. I am following up on this issue.

The second issue raised by the Deputy related to the Dublin Airport Authority. Airlines are critical to the success of the tourism industry. Aer Lingus has requested a meeting and I look forward to meeting its representatives shortly. I am happy to discuss all aspects of their business that impact on tourism. There are still 100 flights a week between Ireland the US but capacity fell last summer and again during the winter. However, the US economy has experienced a slight upturn, as has the Canadian economy. There is great potential for additional flights and I look forward to marketing this further.

On the OPW issue, I concur with the Deputy that its officials do great work. However, as Deputy Mansergh just said to me, it is difficult to be free and commercial. Free access is provided to these wonderful facilities. I have always found the guides to be tremendous and the flexibility in opening times serves the tourism industry well. Wearing my previous hat, I had hoped the public service generally and the OPW sites would be used for the graduate placement scheme. There would be great scope for young graduates to work on OPW sites this summer. They could bring great added value as they are well educated and trained. Hopefully, following the agreement at the public service pay talks, this might be addressed and this could give an added boost to the good work done by the OPW.

See this speech in context