Covid-19 restrictions cost Irish hotels €2.6bn last year
The IHF is calling on the Government to put in place an emergency tourism budget to help the sector recover.
Irish hotels and guesthouses suffered a €2.6bn drop in revenues last year as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the latest survey from the Irish Hotels Federation (IHF).
The 60% drop in revenue compared to the previous year is credited to the restrictions brought in to curb the spread of the virus, with the decline in room occupancy levels for the sector plummeting to a record low of just 30% last year compared to 73% in 2019.
Tim Fenn, chief executive of the IHF, said the industry had experienced nothing short of a “catastrophic financial shock” and was now at risk of a prolonged, devastating impact on the sector which could affect the ability of tourism businesses to survive and recover.
“Government supports so far have been piecemeal,” he said, adding they had fallen “far short of what is required” given the extended restrictions and economic damage facing the hotel and tourism industry.
The IHF is calling on the Government to put in place an emergency tourism budget, which would include substantial increases in payments to tourism businesses under the Covid restrictions supports scheme (CRSS), enhanced employment subsidies, extension of the local authority rates waiver until the end this year, and a further six-month moratorium on bank term loans to support cashflow.
Mr Fenn said the representative body was also calling for "a clear commitment" from the Government to retain the 9% tourism Vat rate which was agreed in October's budget to assist recovery and "secure a viable and sustainable future" for the industry.
“As yet, they have no pricing certainty in relation to retention of this critically important Vat measure and this must urgently be addressed," Mr Fenn said.
Prior to Covid-19, tourism businesses supported one in 10 of all jobs in Ireland.
An estimated 160,000 tourism jobs have been lost since March last year.
“The Government’s priority must be to ensure everything possible is done to recover these jobs,” Mr Fenn said.
“These jobs matter, not only to the people working within the industry but also to the wider economy, especially the many parts of regional Ireland where tourism is the only show in town.”
“A failure to support the industry now will have ramifications for the future of Ireland’s tourism offering and for the economy that could take decades to recover fully."
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