Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I also welcome the Bill and wish it every success. I had no idea that its purpose was to win the World Cup until I heard the Minister of State's comments. I hope he will be successful in that regard.

Aside from winning the World Cup, one of the reasons for my enthusiasm in respect of this Bill is that approximately three weeks ago, I visited Dayton, Ohio. My first visit to the United States took place in 1961 and was to Dayton, Ohio. At the time, I was devastated to discover that its centre or core was simply empty. There was nothing there. I could not figure out what had happened to it. As the Minister of State noted, this is precisely what is likely to happen to the core of Irish cities unless something is done about it. On my return a few weeks ago, the situation had changed. While I am unsure whether a business improvement districts policy was implemented there, it now has a thriving city centre. As the Minister of State outlined worldwide developments, I understood that this may be what took place there as well.

Potentially, this Bill will be a useful addition to the range of ways to get things done at the interface between commercial business and public life. Senator Brady has alluded to this point. I hope that many businesses, and local businesses in particular, will approach the measure positively and will see it as an effective way to add to their competitiveness in the present environment.

I can see one immediate use for the proposed mechanism, namely, in the ongoing struggle between town centres and shopping centres located on the periphery of traditional towns. As a retailer who has had a presence in both camps, I can claim a certain familiarity with the issues involved. Traditional town centres developed in an age which greatly differs from the present. The most important difference is that in the heyday of town centres, cars were not a dominant part of the equation. One located one's business in a town centre because it was where people went to do their shopping and to transact their other quotidian business. Consequently, space in town centres became scarce and expensive.

I recall that the second shop which I opened was located in Finglas. While it did not open until 1965, I applied for planning permission in 1963 and was turned down because the site did not have enough car parking spaces. Previously, I had met the former Deputy Paddy Burke, who condemned the planning authorities in the Dáil. He stated that in Finglas, one needed pram parking spaces rather than car parking spaces. A total of 22 spaces had been allocated, which was thought to be sufficient. Although such an allocation was probably adequate in 1965, this was certainly not the case by 1975 or 1985.

It seems that cars have changed the way in which one shops. The greater importance of cars in people's lives has changed the development of shopping centres. One can shop where one wishes with a car at one's disposal. From the retailers' viewpoint, the edge of traditional towns offered acres of relatively cheap space on which they could have all the space they needed to do their business, as well as providing ample parking for the customers outside. Hence, it is small wonder that the past few decades have seen mushrooming growth of out of town centres, largely at the expense of traditional town centres.

I remember travelling to Waterford five years ago or more, to try to convince the then Waterford Corporation to allow Superquinn to locate a supermarket on the outskirts of town. As Waterford is understandably uptight about such matters, I was careful to use the word "city", rather than "town". I was obliged to argue because of the difference between what is called essential shopping and comparative shopping.

Essential shopping encompasses items such as one's groceries. One can decide to do it all within a single supermarket and if the experience was unsatisfactory, one can go elsewhere the next time. Generally, however, after pulling up in a supermarket's car park, one does all one's shopping there. Comparative shopping is different. If one wishes to buy shoes, jewellery or fashion, one wants to be able to visit a range of shops. This is the purpose of a town centre. It was difficult to convince Waterford Corporation that it was to the benefit of the city to build supermarkets on the outskirts of the town. Understandably, it was quite concerned.

Town centres have tried to fight back and have received much support from many people who do not have a direct business interest in the issue. For a great many people, the traditional town centre provides an important focus for a community. In fact, it is the centre which helps to define the community in the first place. As someone who has developed shopping centres myself, I readily admit that it is virtually impossible to recreate in a shopping centre the same experience that one gets while walking down the main street of a thriving country town.

At present, there is competition between the two ways of doing business. I am pleased that although a few years ago, everyone was ready to write off traditional town centres, at present the outcome is not so clear-cut. The healthiest future approach would be for such competition to continue, rather than for one way of doing business to become the outright winner.

The Minister of State has referred to other countries. I wish to discuss one country which I know quite well, namely, France. Until the passage of the loi Royer in 1974, the centres of France's towns were being devastated. One visited lovely traditional towns which no longer had a core. The same thing has also happened in many other places.

Hence, I believe in promoting competition between town centres and shopping centres on the outskirts of town. If such competition takes place, it will ensure the survival of traditional town centres. I can certainly envisage the idea of business improvement districts playing a very useful and important role. It provides an additional mechanism for businesses in a particular area to work together in their common interest and in the interest of the customers they seek to attract.

Co-operation between neighbouring traders is nothing new. The Minister of State is attempting to encourage it in this Bill. There have always been ways in which businesses could get together to work on a project that benefited them all. There are many highly successful arrangements working at present which could and should continue to work in the future. However, adding to the range of ways in which businesses can co-operate together, and particularly by providing a formal way for the local authority to engage with them, will be a very useful step forward.

Senator Brady discussed graffiti and litter, which is a good example. I have made a considerable number of visits to the Continent recently and have compared the problem there with that at home. The scale of the problem there offers a view of what is in store for Ireland if that graffiti culture is allowed to take root. Recently, in Howth where I live, an off-duty garda saw some young men painting some graffiti on a lovely white wall. Luckily enough, she was able to stop them. While the parent of one of the culprits evinced no great sympathy, the mother of the other young man did. She insisted that her son should clean it up with a toothbrush, to make him work all the harder. However, it was a reminder of what could happen if care is not taken. People can work together on problems such as graffiti and litter.

In recent times, designated tax areas have done much good for towns which may not have prospered otherwise. Three examples with which I am familiar are Kilkenny, Carlow and Clonmel. The three town centres in question were beginning to become tired and were in danger of losing out and the designation of those areas as town centres has worked out very well. In addition, the tax incentive to install multistorey car parks has also helped a great deal. Hence, the Minister of State's proposals in this Bill are a step in the right direction.

Every individual business knows what it must do to serve its own customers better from the moment the latter set foot on the premises. However, as everyone who runs a business knows only too well, many things can happen long before a customer actually gets to that point. If customers dislike an area it constitutes a significant deterrent to attracting business. On the other hand, if customers like an area and enjoy going there, it can be of immense help in drumming up business for every trader who operates there.

Working together and with the local authority, individual businesses have a great deal of control over how their potential customers view the area in which they operate. This applies to factors such as whether an area is clean and has easy parking, whether the overall environment is pleasant and attractive and whether it has promotions like Christmas lights and so on. The list of things that can be done to attract customers is endless.

However, I remember many years ago a number of businesses decided to put up Christmas lights in Dundalk and make the town more attractive to compete with places such as Newry. We discovered not everyone in the town got involved and put up lights. Clear resentment occurs when some get involved and others do not. This is an incentive to encourage everybody to get involved.

What everybody in an area has in common is the need to work together to achieve those objectives. Usually, no individual business will be able to do the job on its own. While a local authority may get involved in promoting an urban development area, in general it will tend to shirk away from promoting one area as against another, which is understandable.

That is why it is right this Bill places the main onus for the development of these schemes on the businesses themselves, rather than on the local authority. The local authority can, and I hope will, be a vital facilitator. However, it will be up to the businesses themselves to take the initiative that brings these districts into existence, and it will be up to those businesses to provide the driving force to make them a success.

I commend the Minister of State for bringing forward this idea. In doing so, he has used a technique which is a favourite of my own. Instead of trying to reinvent the wheel, one first scours the world to see whether anyone else has already risen to the challenge. The idea of business improvement districts has proved itself, as the Minister stated, in Canada and the US for more than 30 years. In more recent times it has also come to Europe including efforts in Britain, although RGDATA claims approximately 40% of smaller towns in Britain do not have a general store, supermarket or grocery store in the centre of the town. I have no doubt that with the proper promotion BID schemes can also be a success here in Ireland. It will work.

We have not done enough on subsidiarity, the EU principle of passing decision making closer to the citizen. Instead of making laws in Brussels they should be made locally. It is interesting to see local decisions being passed to traders throughout Europe. Often, traders came together and decided on restrictive opening hours, until those close to national frontiers with countries which do not have such legislation find they have lost business to those other countries.

With this Bill, which is worthy of support, responsibility will be passed to local businesses and that is likely to succeed. I wish the Bill and the scheme every success. The Minister of State's heart is in the right place and he is going in the right direction. The Bill may need correction and we had such discussion this morning. We may find on Committee Stage changes will be made but the Minister of State will be likely to respond to any suggestions.