Plans to develop the National Museum at Collins Barracks in Dublin have been put on hold because of budgetary constraints, it was revealed today.
Artifacts including a number of historical pieces brought back from the south seas by Captain Cook were to go on display once the exhibition space had been suitably expanded. The Asgardyacht, which is currently undergoing restoration at the museum, was also expected to be placed on show once the project had been completed.
According to the answer to a parliamentary question from Fine Gael's tourism spokeswoman Olivia Mitchell yesterday, the Government is to postpone plans to develop the former military barracks due to the recession.
Speaking in the Dáil yesterday, Minister of State at the Department of Finance Martin Mansergh said progress on the project was at advanced stage and the Office of Public Works was in the process of finalising tender documents which would be ready by April. However, he said that development of the museum would not proceed as planned until the overall financial situation improved.
Ms Mitchell today criticised the decision to put the project on hold saying that it would end up costing Ireland more in the longer-term than it would save.
“Instead of abandoning projects such as this, the Government should be trying to develop and expand upon Ireland’s cultural tourism," she said.
"Alongside the financial folly of scrapping revenue-generating projects, there is also the issue that planning permission for the exhibition space will lapse at the end of this year and it is unclear as to how many hoops would have to be jumped through to receive it again.
“The tourist figures for 2008 confirmed that more visitors left Ireland than visited in 2008, the first time this happened in 18 years. With the Government making short-sighted moves such as this, it seems pretty clear that the trend won’t be reversed anytime soon,” she added.
The former military barracks, which opened as a museum in 1997, is one of Ireland's biggest tourist attractions.
According to figures from Fáilte Ireland, visitors to the museum doubled in 2007, moving up more than 10 places to number 11 in the most visited tourist attractions in Ireland with some 375,000 visitors.
