Violet-Anne Wynne (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will talk about tourism and hospitality because somebody needs to do so and this Government refuses to do so. When this country was coming out of recession, it was tourism and hospitality, alongside agriculture, that led the way, and the Government acknowledged that in the form of the 9% VAT rate. That rate allowed businesses to be bold, to take risks, to improvise and to adapt. As we know, many had to do so because since then they have dealt with Brexit, Covid and a cost-of-living crisis in which food and other goods in Ireland are now 46% more expensive than the EU average.

Many tourism communities in Clare, such as Kilkee, Lahinch and Lisdoonvarna, have given over a huge share of their tourism beds to the humanitarian crisis. That has had a direct impact on passing trade in their communities and in my constituency of Clare more broadly. I meet with these businesses constantly and they tell me that, without the 9% VAT rate, some of them will simply not be able to go on. This budget has a lot of lofty ambitions but does not protect the tourism and hospitality businesses that kept more than 10,000 people in my constituency in work throughout the crises of the past decade. This State has spent millions of euro on tourism promotion abroad over the past decade, and now the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation, ITIC, informs us that we need 11,500 tourism beds before 2032. Where will those beds come from? This Government has completely pushed the sector into the cold in this budget.

On rental tax credits, I welcome the increase and note the new tax credit for landlords, but the Government has closed the gate after the horse has bolted. This is a piecemeal measure and too little too late after the private rental sector has already been decimated. The Government has not done enough for those who are in despair today and will be in despair tomorrow with the crazy rent increases.

In my last few seconds I will mention the residential zoned land tax, RZLT. The Taoiseach promised that the Government would sort out the issues with it. Once more I call on the Government to make good on the promise to the Irish Farmers' Association, IFA, to make the necessary amendments in the Finance Act to remove all genuinely farmed land from the RZLT.

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