Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail)

I am sure the Minister does not want to listen to a range of Second Stage speeches, having sat through an interesting debate yesterday. I will be as focused as I can. I was interested in Senator Barrett's position on this and that he revealed that he had been on the board of Bord Fáilte in the 1980s. My experience was different to Senator Barrett's. I agree and I am sure the Minister does as well, with the broad thrust that there should be accountability and all of that. However, I do not think we should throw the baby out with the bath water. As chairman of Fáilte Ireland north west, a regional organisation and I discussed this with Senator O'Sullivan from Killarney in the south west. We fought very hard for the money that was made available for the various projects. The money made available through the festival and special events budget with which the Minister will be familiar, which has been reduced considerably as a result of the recession, is still a vital cog in the marketing machine. The festivals and special events budget is allocated to festivals and events across every town and village in the respective area. As far as the north west was concerned, we did our best to ensure that we gave this as a support. It was not a great deal of money but it made the difference in some instances. In many of the cases that money was used for marketing purposes.

I am sure Senator Barrett was not suggesting it for one moment, but having listened to him, I got the impression that he felt money spent on marketing tourism was a waste of time. The evidence is different. I paid tribute yesterday to Mr. Niall Gibbons, CEO and the staff of Tourism Ireland for the job they have been doing in the most difficult circumstances in the past couple of years. They launched their marketing strategy for 2012 yesterday. The figures speak for themselves. There has been a turnaround, albeit a small turnaround, in all of our major markets and this did not happen by chance. Tourism is a very competitive business and any suggestion that the marketing budget be spancelled at a time when we need to get more people into the country does not make sense. Accountability is fine but a cost benefit analysis on a marketing budget is questionable. Senator Quinn will be aware of the age old adage that when one spends a euro on advertising one asks which 50 cent is effective? It is not an exact science, but no one should suggest that the marketing budget should be subject to a reduction at a time when we need to be out there selling Ireland. The facts show that increased funding in the past two years - and this Government, in particular gave increased funding for marketing at a very difficult time earlier this year - proved to be successful.