I welcome the opportunity to speak in this debate. I agree with the last part of what Senator O'Toole said. It is now recognised that tourism is one of the major leading industries in the world economy. Annual statistics which I read recently show that the annual turnover of worldwide tourism, travel and leisure is now in the order of £2 million billion. It would be even difficult to write that down in figures. It is an enormous amount. The return on tourism is more than the gross national product of the Federal Republic of Germany and the UK combined. We are talking here about an industry that is absolutely enormous.
The tourism, travel and leisure industry is estimated to employ more than 100 million people right throughout the world. Jobs are created at a higher rate in this industry than in any other sector. Over the last ten years, in virtually every OECD country, the number of people employed in tourism-related industries has risen more rapidly than in all other service industries and far faster in actual fact than the employed labour force as a whole.
The scale of the industry can be gauged from the fact that in most of the industrialised countries it employs more people than agriculture, the motor industry, electronics, iron and steel and textiles put together. A spectacular statistic is that in the US since 1976 15 per cent of all employment growth at 3.2 million jobs has been in the tourist-related sector. In Europe, 10 per cent of total employment was in the tourism, travel and leisure sector.
As we all know, the industry is now being restructured. Senator O'Toole referred to this. The whole emphasis is away from sun holidays because of the fear of melanoma, or skin cancer, which we were taking about. The emphasis is now on health and health-related holidays and because of that the whole emphasis in relation to the attraction of tourism and tourist-related activities is being restructured. This has enormous implications for this country — Senator O'Toole has referred to it — in terms of the benefit which can accrue from the change in emphasis on holidays and tourism and also in terms of the need to be prepared to harness all the benefits that can accrue from the change in attitudes of people throughout the world. There is this big trend away from the sun holidays where one is lying in the sun, because of all of the difficulties and rightly so. It has been proven that too much exposure to the sun causes a lot of problems both in terms of skin cancer and other ailments.
We all hope that the summer will not be too bad and that we will get our fair share of the sun but even if the sun does not shine every single day we have many attractions and advantages that they do not have in other countries. Senator O'Toole emphasised one in relation to our food. It is not just one factor. We have other advantages also that we should exploit. We have a beautiful rugged country, we have a culture and heritage. Those are all very important factors that we must develop. Tremendous strides have been made but it is only the tip of the iceberg as far as tapping the potential of our resources are concerned.
May I be parochial for a moment and refer to the Shannon, and Lough Derg which is the lower of the three lakes on the River Shannon. I come myself only four miles from that lake and we regard it as one of the finest lakes in Europe. We are delighted with the brief of Shannon Development, the tourism promoters for the mid-west region and I want to acknowledge the outstanding work they are doing in the region in relation to tourism. They have been given the responsibility for the development of the agri-tourism sector as well. That, allied to the actual tourism sector, will be of tremendous benefit to the whole region. The enthusiasm and commitment with which Shannon Development have taken on this project allied to the other tourism promotional activities they are invovled in, are outstanding. From the chairman, Jack Daly, and their chief executive, Tom Dunne, right down the line through all the staff in Shannon Development they deserve great praise. The amazing degree of adaptation and flexibility and the will to achieve is an example of what can be done by a public body when they set their mind to it. They are certainly giving value for money and I would like to congratulate them on the tremendous strides they are making.
We in the county council have set up an elected representatives group comprising members of North Tipperary, Clare and Galway in relation to the development of the whole Lough Derg lake. It is under the chairmanship of Councillor John Sheehy and we meet regularly with a working group of State bodies who are interested in that region which is co-ordinated by Shannon Development. There is a very close relationship between all of those bodies and the working groups. The tremendous success those groups have shown with the working group of elected representatives in a very short time has been absolutely outstanding. In view of the success in this case, perhaps at some stage it could be considered whether the brief of Shannon Development be extended to encompass a larger region for the development of the Shannon region. The potential there is absolutely enormous. We had the privilege of meeting members of the Shannon forum in Athlone on a few occasions. It is through communication like that and the exchange of ideas that we can benefit one another rather than vying with one another.
I want to refer to the position of this area in relation to Shannon Airport, and the continuing controversy in relation to the status of Shannon. Any intelligent person who sees the enormous funds being invested in the promotion of tourism and other areas in the Shannon region, allied to the Government policy of decentralisation, would have to conclude that it would be false economy on the one hand to seek to develop a region like that while at the same time, downgrading the international airport that is so vital to the whole mid-western and southern economy. We have to recognise the realities.
The city of Dublin is bursting at the seams. It cannot cope with the existing traffic, let alone any increase in traffic. Every day there is controversy about the traffic situation in the city of Dublin.
There are many notable personalities who would see the downgrading of Shannon as an enormous mistake. Conor McCarthy, who is chairman of the Ryan Hotels group, recently gave statistics which support the status of Shannon and he said that expenditure per tourist via Shannon is 36 per cent higher than expenditure per tourist via Dublin. Another very important statistic is that of the tourists coming into Shannon, 72 per cent visit Dublin but of those who come into Dublin by alternative routes only 40 per cent visit the west and the south-west areas. There is a strong body of opinion which would conclude that Dublin hotels would be the losers if the status at Shannon was changed.
It is interesting to note in all of this that it is the shop lobby that has advocated a change in status of Shannon. It is not the hotels lobby or any other lobby. It is also interesting that Mr. McCarthy, who has two hotels in Dublin, has advocated the status of Shannon should remain and that the whole of the country would lose by a change in that status.
Other prominent people, including the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Deputy O'Kennedy, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Collins, the Minister for Defence, Deputy Daly, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Reynolds, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Deputy O'Malley, The Tánaiste, Deputy Wilson, the Labour Leader, Deputy Dick Spring and Mr. Derek Keogh, Chief Executive of Aer Rianta have all advocated that the Shannon status should not be changed. They are people who have no vested interest in the Shannon development except that they see the reality. The Minister for Tourism, Transport and Communications is on record that he sees no reason why the status should be changed at present. The public should not be fooled into thinking that all of this is about passenger traffic. Local manufacturing industry would be considerable. A survey carried out by the Shannon status campaign shows that 47 companies and seven western counties have indicated its importance.
One should also remember that the airlines are not concerned with economic development. Their duty is to serve their shareholders. Why should they be calling all of the shots? They must have a vested interest in changing the status of Shannon. The whole emphasis should be on giving a service, not getting involved in development. Shannon Airport is a strategic national asset which for more than 45 years has played a vital role in maintaining balanced economic and social development and it has proved to be a generator of jobs and job opportunities. While the current threat to Shannon Airport's gateway status and the level of service with North America jeopardise 2,300 airport and tourism related jobs, the real devastation is already taking place. Investment in industry and tourism in areas where the investment accounts for more in job contributions, to personal income, is being deferred because of the uncertainty about the future level of services and will certainly have a serious impact on the appeal of west of Ireland location options for industry and tourism.
Shannon pioneered the concepts and strategies geared to drawing tourists to the airport, techniques later copied by Amsterdam and in most recent times imitated by emergent Third World nations. Shannon was also keen on launching and testing the feasibility of overseas industrial investment in the country by being picked as a site for a duty free zone where overseas export firms were located so that they would not destabilise native industry in the late fifties and in the early sixties. Tourism and leisure facilities, the fastest growing industry in the world, are strongly influenced by the green factor. The West of Ireland with its pure environment, fresh water, air and food, is a unique attraction in Europe. The EC recognises tourism as a key enterprise in its efforts to cushion and shelter rural and agricultural communities from the worst effects of the dismantling of agricultural supports. Regional policy, and its supports, is being geared to aiding peripheral areas of the EC, including Ireland, to beef up resources and infrastructure to help counterbalance the difficulties.
Over the past year the message being driven home by the Dublin lobby has been that Shannon is all right, it can stand on its own feet with the support of the Atlantic gateway because of its Aeroflot and Aerospace. Aerospace is a breakthrough project which will provide 1,000 jobs but there will be no revenue earning flights to the Shannon region other than landing charges for aircraft coming in for maintenance. The Dublin lobby claim that direct flights to Dublin will add 70,000 to 100,000 US tourists to the Irish market. This is a fallacy. No one can sustain that claim.
The Shannon pre-clearance emigration facility — the only one in Europe — means that a ten to 15 minute procedure there saves up to two hours in a queue at the US destination. That does away with the idea that there is an hour's delay in relation to overflights to Europe. In fact that facility provided at Shannon saves the traveller, in some cases, two to three hours. The switching of Shannon's transatlantic services to Dublin would require investment of £60 million to £100 million in airport facilities to cater for the bulk movement of passengers through the terminal. No EC support is available for such investment which means that funds would have to come from the taxpayer to switch the landing place of tourists from one side of the country to the other.
Only last week the new £12 million Castletroy Park Hotel was officially opened in Limerick. It was built by EGB, the company owned by Mr. Chuck Feeney, an Irish-American who knows his business. He is investing £12 million in the mid-west region. This investment comes to top of £3.5 million invested in refurbishment of the Great Southern Hotel at Shannon Airport, an investment of £1 million in a new hotel in Shannon town and an expansion programme by the Fitzpatrick-owned Shannon Shamrock and the Green Isle Hotel in Limerick.
I want to elaborate on the importance of Shannon Airport to the whole region. Irish-Americans are arriving and putting their money where their mouth is. Those people know where the American tourists want to go and what investment it takes to encourage them to come here. This has been described by a leading Dublin hotelier as a shop's lobby. The Shannon status should remain. I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important issue and I compliment the Minister for Tourism, Transport and Communications on the work he has been doing in the past and I wish him well in the future.