Summary of ideas submitted in the Tourism category…

• Merge Tourism Ireland and Failte Ireland
• Move all passenger boat services from Ringaskiddy to Cobh.
• Negotiate a low cost insurance package for tour operators that makes it cheaper for tourists to hire out bikes, boats, etc.
• New research and development to create exports of our manufactured products.
• Offer a significant reduction in VAT on accommodation & conference venues.
• Offer free flights for tourists who stay longer than two weeks.
• Offer free sea ferry passage to tourists who stay for longer than a week.
• Offer UK and USA tourists the opportunity to pay in their local currency at a better exchange rate.
• Open a military and naval museum Cork city at the old Harbour Commissioners site
• Open more late night coffee/snack bars outside of Dublin
• Open up the banks of all rivers for leisure activities:
• Organise ‘homecoming festivals’ for people with the same surname (i.e. popular Irish surnames such as Murphy, Connolly, McDonagh, Joyce, Duffy, Byrne etc).
• Organise a promotion marketed by Bord Failte whereby tourists who book a meal in a hotel restaurant would be able to stay the night in the hotel at the cost price of the room.
• Package very keen all inclusive value Irish hols
• Paint the main streets of our towns in bright colours.
• Pay bonuses via hotel breaks
• Place remote web cameras at tourist spots and beaches around the country.
• Politicians who normally travel abroad for St Patrick’s Day should stay at home and invite and entertain people from other countries here instead.
• Proceed with the Protected Areas Projects and incorporate agro-tourism structures into these project areas.
• Promote ‘genealogy tourism’.
• Promote adventure sports in Ireland as a tourist attraction.
• Promote diving tourism.
• Promote eco-Tourism.
• Promote Golf holidays.
• Promote hurling and football as tourist attractions and promote Croke Park as a visitor attraction by installing Croke Park ticket booths in O’Connell Street, St Stephen’s Green etc.
• Promote Ireland as a destination for hill walking holidays.
• Promote Ireland as a destination for people combining holidays with doing English courses.
• Promote Ireland as a holiday destination for those with disabilities.
• Promote Ireland’s greenness by using home-grown products in our hotels and restaurants.
• Promote local foods
• Promote storm watching on the Atlantic Coast.
• Promote traditional Irish music and country dancing
• Promote value family holidays in hotels.
• Provide coin operated lockers on beaches.
• Provide funding for a Woody Allen film based and shot in Ireland.