Catherine Noone (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, gave what was really a warning to Dublin hotels in the budget. One does not need to be the Minister for Finance to see that hotels are overcharging in Dublin on an ordinary day in many cases. However, when there is a special event on in the city, they seem to really go for it. Billy Keane's idea is a good one and I agree with it. It would be good if we were able to get hotels to come together and pledge they would not charge extortionate prices for certain events. We do not want to be shooting ourselves in the foot. The tourism industry has recovered and is booming. We do not want to get the international reputation for being a city, or a country, that is very expensive again. It took a long time to get rid of that reputation. Hotels are shooting themselves in the foot by this sort of behaviour.