Testing times for tourism

Identifying Brexit as the greatest challenge facing Irish tourism since the global recession in 2008, the Irish Tourism Industry Confederation (ITTC) has published a Call for Action document. Ciarán Galway meets with Chief Executive Eoghan O’Mara Walsh.

Opening the discussion, O’Mara Walsh outlines the ITIC’s rationale for producing its Brexit and Irish Tourism report. “If the UK economy does dip, the first thing people will cut for the sake of their pockets is travel and tourism – that second holiday, that city break or that trip over to see relatives in Ireland,” he asserts. From a Republic of Ireland perspective, around two in every five international visitors come from UK market; a massive proportion of the market.

Indeed, the latest CSO figures, which came out in late May, show that British visitors to the Republic of Ireland are down 10 per cent for the period February to April. “What this illustrates is that the tourist industry is not crying wolf over our Brexit concerns. The impact is real and materially felt. We think that urgent government action is needed to minimise this.”

Consequently, “We felt compelled to take a lead on it, analyse the implications and come up with what we thought would be good policy solutions so that we could in turn attempt to inform the Government and the Minister to pursue pro-tourism policies.”

All-island brand

O’Mara Walsh outlines that what is necessary for the tourism industry to succeed on the island of Ireland is “a seamless product and experience for the visitor, north, south, east and west”.

“The logic for this is that the international visitor perceives Ireland as a single island destination and doesn’t differentiate between the two jurisdictions. As such, it makes much more sense to market it as a single entity and we obviously have a lot of interaction with Tourism Ireland and northern tourism bodies,” he asserts.

“Tourism is the very definition of free movement of people so anything that impacts upon it, whether that be delays, additional costs or psychological barriers is negative. The all-island marketing of Ireland as a destination has worked very well. Brexit does complicate things, particularly if it is a hard Brexit accompanied by a hard border. Two thirds of the island remaining within the EU and one third existing outside of the EU will make things more difficult.”

Competition

One of the issues that may arise as a result of Brexit is the UK no longer being bound by EU regulations and standards. The UK could be free of state aid rules that currently apply to EU member states and could use this to their advantage and attract more tourists. However, the tourism industry leader emphasises: