Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 249: To ask the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism his plans for the expansion of the tourism industry in 2005; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9464/05]

John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)
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As I mentioned in my reply to a similar question by the Deputy on 17 February 2005, one of my key objectives in 2005 is to see continued progress in the implementation of the actions recommended in the report of the tourism policy review group, New Horizons for Irish Tourism.

The implementation group set up to drive forward the New Horizons agenda, has identified ten priority actions which it considered vital to sustaining future growth. Of these, the restoration of Ireland's competitive position remains the most important and the most challenging. Another priority identified in the report, and a particular priority for myself, is the provision of a national conference centre in Dublin. I expect to see continued progress on this project in 2005.

Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland have developed a comprehensive set of plans and programmes aimed at assisting the industry to respond to the key challenges ahead and at facilitating its continued development in 2005. Some of the initiatives contained in those programmes are set out below.

The key market priority for Tourism Ireland in 2005 is to reinvigorate Ireland's position in the British market. We have set very ambitious growth targets for Irish tourism in the new horizons report but, without volume growth from Britain, these will be difficult to achieve.

Tourism Ireland has completed its overall strategic review of the British market and has commissioned the most comprehensive consumer research which it has ever carried out in any market. The results of that work are being fed into its campaigns in Britain for the rest of the year. Last week, I attended a number of functions in the British market to help with Tourism Ireland's promotional campaign.

Another key challenge for tourism — the growing disparity in the performance of the regions — is being addressed by both Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland with specific initiatives to heighten the regional impact of Ireland's marketing activities, both internationally and at home. Happily, recent access developments hold good promise in this regard, in particular the announcements by Ryanair regarding its plans to develop Shannon Airport as a European hub, American Airlines' announcement regarding new services from Boston and Chicago, and Continental Airlines' plans for a new direct service to Belfast. These developments build on a significant expansion by Aer Lingus of its European route network in recent years. Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland will work to optimise the inbound tourism potential of these new routes.

All regions will be featuring prominently in the full range of marketing activities and a dedicated marketing fund for tactical co-operative initiatives with the regional tourism authorities and their members has been established for 2005. In Britain, a region-to-region approach is being adopted to capitalise on direct access links to the regions. In north America, specific campaigns promoting the western seaboard are being mounted. In continental Europe, a sponsor a region approach is being adopted in which each market office will focus attention, alternately, on a particular Irish region in order to enhance the awareness of the local trade of what that region has to offer.

On the domestic front, an enhanced consumer website with increased functionality and a strong regional input has been launched which will provide for more dynamic and up-to-the minute packages. There will be a strong focus on event-based holidays which will be complemented by a more streamlined and targeted festivals and cultural events fund, which will continue to favour the less developed regions.

Strategic investment in capital projects in under-performing areas through the tourism product development scheme will continue in an effort to match the quality of the product available on the ground with more demanding consumer expectations. In order to further encourage the development of new projects under the scheme, I requested Fáilte Ireland last year to invite further investment proposals for financial assistance under the special interest pursuits category of the scheme.

With an indicative grant fund of €12 million to be allocated between the Border, midlands and western, BMW, and southern and eastern regions, I look forward to seeing increased investment in pursuits such as equestrian, cycling, walking, great gardens, specialist outdoor activities, water-based tourism and health tourism. At enterprise level, a range of new initiatives has been developed to address competitiveness, including a new online facility to help individual enterprises benchmark their financial performance against similar enterprises and to highlight areas for improvement.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 250: To ask the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism the extent to which cost factors which may be a deterrent to the tourism industry have been identified; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9466/05]

John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)
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Cost factors are undoubtedly a significant influence on Ireland's competitive position as a tourist destination. This has been identified as a key issue that needs to be addressed if we are to grow overseas tourist numbers.

The impact of high costs on Ireland's competitiveness has been identified through a number of on-going studies, including the major exit surveys conducted by Fáilte Ireland, as well as benchmarking studies. These studies have shown that, from an industry perspective, overall running costs — including overheads such as heating, electricity, waste management, water, etc., — the cost of labour and cost of insurance are key issues.

Progress has been made, particularly in respect of insurance costs, and Ireland's overall inflation level is approaching EU averages. However, given the extraordinary growth in the Irish economy, it is likely that a number of the cost factors, such as labour availability and cost, will continue to present a challenge for the industry.

The industry needs to do whatever it can to best manage costs and, like most other businesses, to see what it can do to improve overall productivity. Fáilte Ireland is rolling out programmes to help individual tourism enterprises to better manage costs and also to benchmark performance against competition both national and international. Examples include performance plus, the business solutions toolkit and a legal and financial advice platform.

Performance plus is basically an online facility for hoteliers which allows individual operators to assess their performance in the financial, environmental and productivity areas against that of comparable businesses. Depending on the outcome of that assessment, the facility gives guidance about next-steps and also provides case-studies aimed at helping to improve performance.

The business solutions toolkit is an interactive CD-ROM which offers practical advice on cost controls and business systems to smaller tourism businesses. The legal and financial advice platforms is a free first-consultation-service for tourism businesses. It allows tourism business to access the type of financial and legal advice on key business decisions, which are normally the preserve of larger enterprises.

These are some of the initiatives by the tourism agencies which are designed to help our tourism sector to cope a bit better with some elements of the competitiveness challenge.