Ollie Crowe (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Last Thursday, the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Deputy Catherine Martin, appointed members to the tourism recovery oversight task force. More than 100,000 people are employed in restaurants and bars across this country. Although they may not be the first thing one thinks of when it comes to tourism, bars and restaurants are a key component of the tourism sector, with four out of five visitors citing Irish pubs as their number one tourist attraction. We are all aware of the huge success of the Guinness Storehouse and the number of tourists that visit it in Dublin each year.Food and drink expenditure is a substantial part of tourism direct spending. Some 35% of overseas visitors' total spending is on food and beverages, amounting to €2 billion annually. Tourism is the primary market for many restaurants and pubs. Given the contribution made by restaurants and bars to the tourism sector, I wish to highlight their lack of representation on the recovery oversight group announced last week. It was disappointing. Will the Minister, Deputy Catherine Martin, take immediate steps to rectify this by making two appointments of representatives of restaurants and bars to the group? If she does so, I will accept that it is an oversight. The group appointed last Thursday is not representative of the tourism groups across the country.