Flynn demands five-year freeze on rates for Mayo businesses impacted by refugee intake

A Westport-based county councillor has called for a five-year freeze on commercial rates for businesses in Mayo affected by a drop off in tourist football.

At present, over 20 percent of the county’s Fáilte Ireland-registered accommodation is being used as refugee accommodation.

Cllr Peter Flynn has called on Mayo County Council’s Tourism SPC to write to Minister for Enterprise, Simon Coveney, demanding a five-year freeze for Mayo businesses ‘impacted by the refugee crisis’.

Cllr Flynn said that the consequent drop in revenue for Mayo County Council should be funded by a direct government subsidy.

He said that many local businesses were receiving rates valuations based that were ‘completely false’ due to the drop-off in tourist numbers.

The local authority has forecast a revenue of €44,660,815 from commercial rates in 2023.

“All of that data is based on accounts from two years ago, and we didn’t have the volume of international protection [applicants] coming in,” Cllr Flynn said at Mayo County Council’s Tourism SPC meeting.

“So people now, in the last number of weeks, have received rate bills based on completely false revenue numbers.”

Figures gathered at Croagh Patrick and the Great Western Greenway from 2023 revealed that visitor numbers had almost halved since 2019.

Cllr Flynn estimated that Mayo was losing 1,800 visitors every night due to the amount of registered tourist accommodation allocated to refugees.

“If you take just the weekends alone…that has a massive impact,” Cllr Flynn said.

“Even if they were only spending one-hundred euros a night, that’s €180,000 a night that’s disappeared out of this county. That’s €360,000 every weekend that’s not coming into this county.”

A government from May 2023 – cited by Cllr Flynn at the meeting - estimated that Westport had lost over €33 million in tourist revenue and displaced 898 jobs.

Local businesspeople in Westport told The Mayo News last month that the town may see further job losses if the 2023 tourist season was repeated this year.

Cllr Flynn described various government supports currently available to counties who have taken in large numbers of refugees as ‘lip service’.

He also accused Mayo TDs and senators of being ‘largely silent’ on the issue.

Cllr Christy Hyland seconded Cllr Flynn’s proposal, stating that the issue was the fault of government mismanagement and not refugees.

“There are people out there…they have sought to accommodate refugees in their homes, they have extra bedrooms. But no, the department go the easy route and take up all the bed nights,” the Independent councillor said.

Cllr Michael Loftus (Fianna Fáil) also supported Cllr Flynn’s motion, suggesting that businesses see their rates capped at 2021 levels.

“I totally agree with what Peter is saying, but it would be just for tourist-related ratepayers, not for the industrialists,” added Cllr Loftus.

The meeting was told that over 2,800 Ukrainian refugees are currently living in accommodation provided by the International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) in Mayo.

A total of 1,013 Ukrainian refugees are being accommodated in Mayo households in receipt of the €800 monthly Accommodation Recognition Payment.

Over 4,800 PPS numbers have been issued to Ukrainian refugees under the Temporary Protection Directive since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.