In one of his first acts as Minister with responsibility for tourism, John O'Donoghue has allocated an additional €3 million to market Ireland overseas. Tourism Ireland has also stumped up another €1.5 million to support the Minister's effort. The new money is on top of the €28 million which the governments in Dublin and Belfast are jointly spending this year to attract visitors to the island, North and South, writes Wesley Boyd.
Much of the money will be spent in Britain. Along with the cheque Mr O'Donoghue should send an unequivocal direction to our lackadaisical hoteliers: Forget the ancient wrongs; start flying the flag.
More than half our tourists come from Britain. In 2001, according to the latest Bord Fáilte returns, out of a total of 5,930,000 visitors to the Republic, 3,416,00 came from across the Irish Sea. In addition, there were 518,000 visitors from Northern Ireland - not all of whom, it can be taken, were of the nationalist/republican tradition.
Flagpoles galore
Driving around Ireland of the Welcomes and staying in hotels here and there, it soon becomes apparent that our hoteliers are either not aware of these statistics or deliberately choose to ignore them. There are flagpoles galore outside their premises adorned with the flags of the United States, Guinea-Bissau, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Swaziland and Tuvalu. In short, any flag from the farthest point on the planet except the Union Jack.
In a ramble round Munster recently, the only place where I saw our sterling visitors being given recognition and parity of esteem was at the Waterford Crystal visitors' centre. There the Union Jack was flown alongside the Tricolour and the Stars and Stripes.
Flags, of course, have long been used and abused as symbols of puffed-up patriotism and parochialism on this divided island, notably by those at the extreme corners of the sectarian card. Predictably, Sinn Féin objected to the Government's decision to fly the Tricolour at half-mast from public buildings on the day of the Queen Mother's funeral in London. Its supporters also made a noisy display of triumphancy during the recent general election counts, waving the Tricolour as if it belonged to themselves alone.
Sinn Féin is big on flags and emblems. So is Ian Paisley. He first came to widespread public notice in 1963 when he organised a march to Belfast City Hall to protest at the Corporation's decision to lower the Union Jack to mark the death of Pope John XXIII. (This march, incidentally, was the first loyalist parade to be banned under the Special Powers Act.)
Westminster election
The bold Ian was at it again a year later during the Westminster general election campaign. The Republican Party (as Sinn Féin was then known in the North) displayed the Tricolour and the Plough and the Stars in the window of its office in Divis Street in support of its candidate for West Belfast, Billy McMillen.
The display of the flags attracted no notice for about a fortnight. Then Mr Paisley got wind of the Republican insult to queen and country and threatened to lead a march on Divis Street if the police did not take action to remove the Tricolour. The RUC served a restriction order on him and at the same time broke into the Republican Party's office and snatched the Tricolour from the window display. (They left the Plough and the Stars.) The Tricolour was replaced by the Republicans and when the RUC arrived to remove it again rioting broke out. The riots in Divis Street continued for several nights and were the worst that Belfast had seen for more than 30 years.
Covering the riots for this newspaper at the time, I interviewed those on both sides. "This is a republican area and the flag was giving offence to no-one," said Billy McMillen. "There was no trouble until that man Paisley started shouting about it." During the rioting the legally restricted Mr Paisley offered his intemperate comments from the sidelines. "I don't accept that any area of Ulster is republican," he told me. "I don't want to see the Tricolour flying here. I intend to see that the Union Jack flies everywhere."
Sinn Fein's criticism of the lowering of the national flag for the Queen Mother's funeral indicates that, 40 years on from the Divis Street riots, the bigoted silliness about flags has not gone away entirely. But as relations with our nearest neighbour grow more cordial by the day, it is surely not as deep-rooted as it was years ago. There may still be threats and taunts from local republican bully-boys and vandals, but hoteliers should make the respectful gesture of flying the flag of the majority of their guests.
Attracting visitors
As the tourist trade increases its efforts to attract visitors from Britain in the hope of compensating for the drop of 14 per cent from the North American market last year and an estimated 17 per cent decline this year, it should look at the currencies in its till. Bord Fáilte figures indicate the British spent €1,240 million last year, compared with €719 million by Americans and €790 million by mainland Europeans. Visitors from Northern Ireland left €143 million behind them last year and probably prevented not a few small hotels and guesthouses from going under.
Given that a fair proportion of the visitors from the North regard the Union Jack as their national flag, it is clear the overwhelming majority of our paying guests share the one allegiance. Time to run up their flag.