Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with the Minister of State, Senator Hackett, on the proposal of a public bank. It has worked very well in Germany, which is a European colleague country of ours, and should be looked at.

I am speaking today because coming from County Clare, which is heavily dependent on tourism, I am concerned that we are not necessarily properly prepared. A lot of work can be done in advance of the tourism sector's reopening. This work is critical and we need a debate on it. In the first instance, Shannon Heritage last year faced quite an amount of uncertainty. This has not been clarified; the uncertainty continues this year. We learned recently that the head of operations has now moved on from Shannon Heritage. We need clarity on the future of Shannon Heritage. We need to know whether it will remain with the Shannon Group or whether it will move to the Office of Public Works, OPW, which would be a far more appropriate home, with the knowledge, infrastructure and marketing capability for Shannon Heritage to achieve its potential. Similarly, we have no clarity whatsoever regarding the position of the chair of the board of Shannon Group. The last incumbent, who lasted a day, resigned in the middle of February. We are now towards the end of April and we still have no clarity whatsoever as to who will take up this extremely important role in chartering the future of Shannon Airport, which in turn will drive the economic development of the entire midwest region, including County Clare.

Finally, many of the Government measures for the hospitality and tourism industry are welcome, including the announcement of funding for restaurants and so on to buy infrastructure for outside dining and to become capable of outside dining and that the outside areas of their premises would be brought into use for outside catering. However, this funding needs to extend to all establishments doing food. The position regarding pubs is absolutely ridiculous, many of which throughout the tourism areas of Clare, Kerry and other parts of the country provide dining and catering facilities. It is absolutely critical that this anomaly is addressed without delay.Publicans and the pub, catering and hospitality industries have suffered enough. Simple clarity like that should just happen. We should not have to stand up here, looking for it to happen.