Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent)
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91. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport his views on whether a cultural group (details supplied) that have used a centre is now being precluded from doing so in view of the fact that his Department is the sponsoring Department for the centre. [39764/19]

Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent)
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The national conference centre, known as the Convention Centre Dublin (CCD), is a Public Private Partnership. Under the terms of the Project Agreement, the Office of Public Works (OPW) acts as "the Authority" on behalf of the Government and a private company is responsible for managing and operating the centre. Under the agreement, any issues relating to use of the premises are properly dealt with by the facility operator.

The primary objective in developing a national conference centre, as set out in the Project Agreement, is to increase Ireland's share of the international conference market, thereby increasing tourism revenues. In light of this objective, my Department is the “sponsoring Department” of the centre. As such, my Department has some responsibilities relating to monitoring and reviewing of the CCD's performance in the context of delivering on overall tourism policy objectives, including motivating large numbers of international conference delegates to visit Dublin and Ireland.

However, my Department has no role or involvement in relation to the CCD's commercial and operational decisions including those relating to programming or commercial bookings.