Ivana Bacik (Independent)

I welcome the Minister and apologise for my absence during her speech, which was caused by a meeting I had with one of her Cabinet colleagues. However, I have had an opportunity to read her speech and will make a number of comments on it. I am grateful to have an opportunity to discuss the issue of tourism with her and appreciate her presence in the House.

As the Minister will be aware, the Labour Party recently published a policy paper on tourism. I am grateful to my party colleague, Deputy Mary Upton, who developed our proposals. I will refer to some of the points made in the paper and give some examples of areas which present challenges and opportunities for the tourism industry.

We all welcome the Government's strategy and action plan and the work done by the tourism renewal group. In view of the difficult economic times and falling visitor numbers, it is important we work in accordance with an overall strategy to increase the number of people employed in tourism, visiting the country and holidaying at home. As the Minister noted, Fáilte Ireland's holiday at home promotion has been highly successful. This is a growth area because when budgets are tight people are more inclined to stay at home.

Holidaying at home is also a demographic issue. As a parent of young children, I prefer to holiday at home because it is easier than travelling abroad. From my personal experience of tourism in Ireland, I have concluded that parents with young pre-school children form a specific market, almost a subcategory of families, because they can holiday in September and are not restricted by school holidays. This flexibility allows them to obtain better value, which is a major issue when one holidays in Ireland.

As Members will be aware, hotel and self-catering accommodation costs can be high. One of the problems with trying to book self-catering accommodation, particularly during school holiday periods for people with children, is the absence of an overall rating system by which one can establish in advance what standard or quality will apply to a specific holiday home. In Ireland, one tends to establish such information through word of mouth, trial and error or knowing the area in question. While this is fine for Irish people, it is difficult for visitors from abroad to try to establish through some central mechanism what are the best quality holiday homes and what holiday homes are accessible for children and so forth. This is an area on which Fáilte Ireland could do more.

A second issue for those holidaying at home with children is the problem of where one goes in the evening. The former Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Mr. Michael McDowell, tightened the law on children in pubs and while he did so for valid reasons, the measure has had an unfortunate side-effect. It is often difficult for those holidaying in a rural area who wish to dine out with their children to find an establishment other than a pub which will not kick everyone out at an early hour. From my experience of holidaying in countries such as Spain which are very welcoming of young children and actively accommodate them in restaurants in the evenings, such destinations tend to win out in this area and people will travel to them because this aspect of holidaying can be much easier than in Ireland where it is often difficult to find places to go in the evening.

On the issue of access to Ireland for visitors from abroad, as the Minister stated, the tourism review group recommended abolition of the area travel tax. The Labour Party also favours abolition of the tax and I am pleased the Minister will speak to the Minister for Finance about the issue. The tax has become a focal point for protest from the tourism industry which perceives it as an obstacle to people coming here.

An argument is also made for developing tourism on our offshore islands by increasing ferry services between the islands and marketing them as a package. We must be positive about unique selling points such as our islands. On all my visits to the islands, especially those on the west coast, I have been struck by their incredible beauty and how under-visited they are by Irish people. One tends to meet more people from other European countries than from Ireland on the Aran Islands, for instance.

With regard to regional travel, the Labour Party proposes extending free travel to anyone aged over 66 years who visits Ireland. We also propose marketing the idea of a golden trekker, which would target a specific demographic market. This proposal has significant potential as those aged more than 66 years, like parents of pre-school children, are not confined to travelling at peak times. They could contribute to filling excess capacity in our hotels during off-peak periods.

Integrated ticketing for public transport in Dublin is an important element of a transport strategy to improve tourism. Such a system has been promised for many years and is long overdue. Will the Minister indicate integrated ticketing will be introduced? I understand it will be launched in 2011, although we have heard many times that it will be introduced within a year.

Signage and interactive mapping are other areas which we need to improve. People from abroad who come here on driving holidays often complain about signage. We should try to ensure signs at specific sites lead people to other local attractions. For example, tourists visiting St. Patrick's Cathedral could be directed, through signage, to the antique district on Francis Street, which is a unique part of medieval Dublin and one which is often overlooked by tourists travelling from St. Patrick's Cathedral and Christ Church to the Guinness Storehouse. The idea, therefore, is for people to be mapped or signed through urban centres and rural areas.

On-line resources also need to be improved. I will cite two examples of interesting, small-scale initiatives in Dublin which have great potential. The first, in which friends of mine are involved, is the Dublin culture map, which can be found at www.dnote.info. The Minister may be aware of this clever idea, which is a simple cultural guide that provides information in map format on galleries, art spaces, theatres and other locations of cultural interest. Ideas of this nature can generate interest in Dublin's cultural sites and attractions among tourists and indigenous visitors to the city. This type of low level initiative should be supported by the Department.

A second initiative, which a friend informed me about at the weekend, is Dublin.lecool.com, a Dublin franchise of a weekly newsletter and website which provides an alternative culture guide for different cities. While the idea is new in Dublin, the Barcelona-based newsletter and website covers London, Madrid, Istanbul, Moscow, Lisbon and Budapest. I understand Vienna and Paris will be covered soon and the project is in development for Dublin. This is a small initiative being taken by a couple of individuals with a background in arts and event organisation. It is a good idea because it sets out to market Dublin as a cultural attraction to different groups who search on-line rather than through more traditional routes such as travel agents, brochures and so forth.

We must also examine how we harness technology for tourism in other ways, for example, creating cultural audio tours for MP3 devices or as podcasts, which could be downloaded free of charge on-line. Famous individuals - Bono immediately springs to mind - could do the narrative. I recall visiting the Forbidden City in Beijing on a visit to China many years ago and being stunned to find that Roger Moore was providing the commentary on the English language audio guide for visitors. It was surreal to be guided through this ancient Chinese attraction by his voice. However, it lent a certain additional element to the visit. Using prominent figures in the arts and music world, in particular, as icons for the Irish tourism industry, if they were willing to do so, would be a really good idea and attract a new type of visitor.

The Labour Party document refers to the concept of niche tourism and my specific interest lies in trying to develop cycling tourism, in particular. Amateur cycling events have become a major crowd generator in Ireland. During the summer I was involved in a minor way with others who participated in the Sky Ride in County Clare. This huge event, which started and finished in Ennis, attracted more than 1,000 cyclists and closed roads in west Clare for a day. It brought a huge number of visitors to Ballyvaughan and its environs. It was an excellent example of how visitors could be attracted. The scenery was magnificent, happily the weather was good and I understand the event will take place again next year.

Other speakers have mentioned the dublinbikes scheme which also has been an important way to promote tourism in Ireland. However, when trying to build tourism attractions for cyclists, Ireland has fallen down in the provision of rail transport services. I have taken up the issue with the Minister for Transport and should have forwarded my correspondence to the Minister who is present in the House. It arises from my experience in trying to take bicycles from Dublin to locations such as Clare, west Cork or County Kerry. Ireland has some brilliant and well developed cycling routes such as the Kerry Way which one can complete in a number of days. However, the difficulty is that Iarnród Éireann has changed its policy on carrying bicycles on its trains. I have raised the matter in the House previously, with the Minister for Transport and Iarnród Éireann directly, but I have been told the policy is not going to change any time soon. Unfortunately, because Iarnród Éireann's trains no longer have guards' vans, it cannot guarantee in advance that it will be able to carry more than three or four bicycles on each train. This means that if one has a group of eight or nine friends coming over from England, France or Spain to participate in a major cycling event, as one might often do, they must arrange their own transport through the bus network or hire cars, which for many cyclists is not what they want to do.