D Hotel could house refugees and tourists, says Varadkar
THE Government is working towards a ‘dual use’ for Drogheda’s D Hotel to house both asylum seekers and tourists, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said.
Mr Varadkar told the Dáil yesterday that the Government is looking at accommodating both asylum seekers and tourists in the hotel after opposition to the town’s biggest hotel being contracted by the Government for refugee accommodation for two years.
Mr Varadkar said that Integration Minister Roderic O’Gorman met with business representatives in Drogheda yesterday and will meet with councillors in the town today who have raised concerns about the hotel accommodating asylum seekers.
‘The solution on which the Minister, Deputy O’Gorman, is working is a dual-use option where some of the hotel will provide accommodation for people seeking protection but the rest of the hotel can still be open to tourists and visitors and still operate function rooms and so on.’
Up to 500 international protection applicants are expected to be housed in the D Hotel from March, in a twoyear contract with the Department of Integration.
Labour TD for Louth Ged Nash said that using Drogheda’s biggest hotel to house asylum seekers will have a ‘very real’ economic impact.
‘Drogheda will lose 56% of its tourism hotel beds in March,’ said Mr Nash, as he called for the contract between the Department of Integration and the D Hotel to be ‘re-examined’.
‘Evidence shows a loss of at least €5.4million in revenue locally. There needs to be a mitigation package.
‘We know that Ukrainian families are hosted in hotels side by side with tourists and there are no child protection issues.’
The Taoiseach said the ‘dual-use’ option is the ‘best solution’ for Drogheda and pointed to a similar arrangement working in Blanchardstown and Dundalk.
‘It can be done. We think that is the best solution. We are not sure that the operator will fully co-operate, and there may be issues around child protection and so on.
‘I am sure those things can be sorted out, and we want to do so. That would be the best outcome for Drogheda.’
Mr Varadkar said the Government would also consider providing ‘some additional finance for community facilities as well in the town’.
‘I understand the concern that taking out such a large hotel will have a major negative impact on a town; a town that has come on so much in recent years.’
Fine Gael TD from Louth Fergus O’Dowd said that the people of Drogheda ‘are extremely angry or concerned at the fact that they are losing their only remaining hotel with function rooms’.
‘They are more than willing to play their part but this is not acceptable. They are losing a resource that is essential,’ he said.
He added that the policy of taking this resource away from local people ‘is wrong’.
Last weekend there was a protest of around 300 people outside the hotel in response to the news that it would be housing asylum seekers.
Mr Varadkar said in the Dáil that it was a ‘far-right protest’ and during the protest ‘people from the town were asked to come up and speak and they could not find very many’.
This comes as Fáilte Ireland’s chief executive officer Paul Kelly revealed that 12% of tourist accommodation in the country is now being used to house refugees and asylum seekers and could be costing the economy up to €1.1bn.
He said this figure can rise to as high as 30% in some counties, according to the tourism body’s own research, and ‘it is a very different picture in different parts of the country’.
‘Our research showed that about 12% of registered tourism accommodation is out of tourism use, for humanitarian reasons.
‘That is having a significant impact. We estimate that between €750million and €1.1billion is lost to the Irish economy.’
‘A loss of at least €5.4million locally’