Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Question 36: To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the meetings he has had or plans to have with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment from the Northern Ireland Assembly in relation to tourism; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26503/11]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy will be aware, tourism was specifically identified in the Good Friday Agreement as one of the key areas for North/South cooperation, and consequently it is one of the sectors on which the North/South Ministerial Council meets in Sectoral format. The Council meets in this format in order to make decisions on common policies and approaches in the area of tourism. It also takes decisions on policies and actions to be implemented by Tourism Ireland Limited, a publicly owned limited company established to promote the island of Ireland overseas as a tourist destination. Arrangements are being made for the next North/South Ministerial Council meetings in Tourism Sectoral format which is expected to take place in Armagh before year's end. Amongst the likely discussion items are a review of this year's visitor numbers to the island of Ireland, Tourism Ireland's Business Plan for 2012 and, major tourism opportunities North and South in 2012 and 2013.

In addition to North South Ministerial Council meetings, I and my Government colleagues intend to strengthen North/South relations by engaging with our counterparts in the Northern Ireland Executive more widely. In that context, I hope to meet Minister Foster for an informal discussion on matters of common interest on October 5th, when she plans to visit Dublin for the launch of Northern Ireland 2012.

In addition to such formal or informal meetings with Ministers or officials from the Executive, I attend a range of tourism events and functions which, given that tourism is an area of North/South cooperation, are also attended by officials from the Northern Department. Finally, my own offcials continue to meet on a regular basis with their counterparts from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland to discuss areas of ongoing cooperation in tourism.