Martin Conway (Fine Gael)

We have entered the summer period and hopefully the sun will shine on our beautiful island and the number of tourists who will come here will increase during the next few months. When I go to restaurants and meet people in the hospitality industry they regularly tell me that the reduction of the VAT rate to 9% made a huge different in terms of tourism and employment. I request the Leader to ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport to come to the House at some stage for a debate on the Gathering. It is an innovative and interesting concept that was launched in recent weeks. It will encourage people of Irish decent throughout the world to make a special effort to visit Ireland in 2013. Communities around the country have been encouraged to run events and to up the ante to encourage people who would have connections with their communities to spend time in Ireland during 2013. It is a good initiative that deserves the support of this House and of all Irish citizens throughout the world and it deserves to be embraced by our embassies and business community throughout the world. Members may have ideas that could feed into the Gathering project and such a debate would be very worthwhile. Tourism is our only natural resource and were tourist numbers to increase it would have a massive benefit for our economy. A debate on tourism with a specific focus on the Gathering could be very useful.