Boosting tourism is generally a winner in Ireland. The industry is of huge importance to the economy, both in terms of employment and also in support for less urban communities less likely to benefit from some other forms of economic activity.
As Fáilte Ireland director of sector development Jenny De Saulles told an Oireachtas committee last month, tourism drives €10 billion in revenue per year and supports 226,000 jobs.
You can see then why Airbnb would see the merit in spreading some love in the form of a €100,000 Rural Tourism Fund.
On Monday, 11 local projects in Cavan, Clare, Cork, Galway, Kerry, Waterford, Westmeath, and Wicklow received funding ranging from €1,000 to €15,000. Whether through fate or lack of applications, the north of the State fared poorly. Above a line from Dublin to Galway, only the Cavan Art Festival caught Airbnb’s eye.
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For the more cynical among us, however, it was the timing of the awards that caught the eye.
Announced at the end of April, they emerged just as the Government was confirming its intention to clamp down dramatically on short-term lets as part of its patchwork of measures to try to ease the housing crisis.
For many rural communities, it’s a no-win argument.
While tourism is essential to the economy of most and the Airbnb money will be welcome for those who receive it, these communities are facing the same housing crisis as more urban parts of the State.
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If they cannot keep their people local, the tourist initiatives they run will inevitably falter; however, without these initiatives, many of those same people will need to relocate for work.
On Airbnb’s side of the equation, while it may continually hark back to its origins in 2007 “when two hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home”, the company and the nature of its hosts have changed significantly since then. For many, it is very much a commercial operation with no interest in tourists getting the flavour of life in a local community.
The budget cut in VAT for restaurants highlights the influence of the tourism lobby, but no one in Government is in any doubt that the pressing political issue of the day is housing. That, despite its size and the awards with which it surely hopes to build support, may ultimately prove Airbnb’s undoing.
