Dublin's failure to build and national conference centre threatens its competitive edge, city business leaders have said.

The Dublin City Centre Business Association says that the longer the debate about whether and where to build such a centre continues, the greater the risk to the city's economy.

Association chief executive, Mr Tom Coffey is now calling for an urgent decision on the issue.

"Conferencing is a multimillion euro industry and Dublin is losing out day after day to London and Paris to name but two European cities, as we cannot cater for the needs of the industry without a conference centre," he said.

"We could find ourselves in a situation where a substantial amount of conference business and its delegate tourism spending is eventually lost because of our own procrastination."

Mr Coffey said city businesses welcomed the announcement by the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, Mr O'Donoghue, that a decision was imminent and urged the Government to ensure that a decision is reached by the end of January at the latest.

Mr Coffey said the centre should be built in the city centre, close to a public transport hub.