The chief executive of Fáilte Ireland has said the passenger cap at Dublin Airport probably represents one of the biggest long-term risks to growth in the tourism industry here in Ireland.
Speaking on Today with Colm Ó Mongáin on RTE Radio, Paul Kelly said Fáilte Ireland wants to see regional airports grow as fast as possible.
"Regional airports cannot make up for the loss in growth we are going to suffer if the cap does not get lifted in Dublin Airport," he said.
"A lot of the flights will move to other airports outside of Ireland, so we do need to see the cap lifted in Dublin Airport," he stated.
Mr Kelly added that the lifting of the cap needs to be done through all the appropriate planning mechanisms and cognisant of the noise pollution for local residents.
Regarding the implications of increasing the cap for carbon emissions, Mr Kelly said we live on an island and realistically for the vast majority of people the only practical way to get in and out of the country is by flying.
"We work with our colleagues in Tourism Ireland on trying to make sure we get the maximum local benefit for any of the carbon that is emitted by people travelling to Ireland," he said.
"We are working on this mechanism of looking at the maximum revenue per kilogram of carbon generated in terms of international aviation to get here. But we cannot omit everything about how we do business here in Ireland by cutting ourselves off from the rest of the world," he said.
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In relation to calls from the industry for a cut in the VAT rate for tourism and hospitality, Mr Kelly said it is a matter for the Minister for Finance.
But he added that as someone involved in tourism he wants to see the lowest possible tax on it and the biggest possible investment in it.
He said what is without doubt is that the cost pressures of running tourism and hospitality businesses at the moment are at an all-time high.
"That is a combination of the significant cost pressures coming through in a whole range of areas, many of them outside of Government control such as energy costs, food input costs, insurance costs," he said.
"And then the increase in employment costs, increase in the minimum wage and the knock-on impact that has through the different levels of the organisation," he added.
He said it is important to acknowledge that all those things happening at the same time, and the further changes coming in terms of employment, is really challenging for people operating businesses where labour costs are a very high proportion of overall costs.
On the question of hotels and tourism accommodation being used by Ukrainian refugees and the impact that is having on availability for tourists, he said it has certainly limited growth in the last couple of years.
He said international tour operators had provided feedback saying that they could not get the accommodation they needed here because hotels they would have used are in Government contracts.
"But that is moving in the right direction," he said, adding that last year around 12% of tourism beds were being used for this purpose, but that has fallen to 10% this year and is expected to continue to fall.
He said 5% is the level where it would not impact the tourism economy.
