(10 years, 3 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Shutt of Greetland
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the opportunities for the economic benefit and the enhancement of the lives of the citizens of the Island of St Helena consequent upon the expected opening of the new Department for International Development-funded airport in 2016.
Lord Shutt of Greetland
My Lords, I am delighted to have been able to secure this debate to discuss matters relating to St Helena.
It was precisely 50 weeks ago that I was privileged to visit St Helena on a second occasion. It was a privilege to go once but an immense privilege to go a second time. The reason for that visit was that the CPA had been invited by the governor to find people to conduct a seminar on governance for the newly elected councillors. As well as me, there was the honourable Tim Crookall from the Isle of Man, Deputy Barry Paint from Guernsey and Joyce Watson, a Member of the Welsh Assembly, and we had the tremendous benefit of a clerk, John Grimes, who is the former Head of Governance of the National Assembly for Wales.
We were there for the governance seminar but had been there for eight days or so, during which we became thoroughly aware of the prevailing issues on the island. We kept being asked, “Are you going to produce a report?”. We were asked that so many times that we discussed it among ourselves and said, “Well, we had better do it”. So we did produce a report, which went beyond observations about the seminar, covering the position of St Helena at that time. A year on, I think it is appropriate to see where we are.
We were delighted to visit the airport construction site and to see what an immense task it is. I certainly congratulate the Government on the important and early decision to build the airport and on the current news, which is that it is on time and on budget. It is always gratifying to hear news such as that about a big construction development, and that development is well over half way.
I am surprised that, 32 months after the signing of the contract and with the work more than half done, we still have no knowledge of any air service, where it will go, how often and at what cost. I am aware that tenders are out, but I am not clear even on what the preferred route of the air service connection is. Indeed, what are the suggestions for the future of freight to the island?
There is a further complication in what is to become of the Ascension Island link. The Wideawake agreement—named after the airport at Ascension—was renewed on 1 October 2008 for five years. It is a very important link, currently by sea, for Saints to go to Ascension for work, and to go on further to the Falklands for work. We do not yet know about any renewal of that link. I find it strange that the US and the UK, which are friendly nations, are having difficulty securing a further agreement. It would be interesting to see whether the Minister has anything to tell us about that.
The new airport will bring clear benefits to islanders in terms of communication and people being able urgently to get to hospitals that can do work beyond what can be done on St Helena. There is also the economic benefit for the island of what I call “sensitive tourism”, for which there is a need for more hotel accommodation. A year ago, we were made aware of three propositions: the luxury Shelco development; the renovation of a fort overlooking Jamestown; and Nos. 1, 2 and 3 Main Street, Jamestown, right in the heart of the town. I wonder what the progress is on those developments. Is there not a problem that hotel developers do not yet know what the air links are going to be? I have looked on the internet and it is clear that you can now make bookings for exotic places in 2016. People who want to go to exotic places often think ahead quite a long way. Is there not a difficulty for St Helena, since we do not know where, when and at what cost aeroplanes will start?
On the Sunday evening when I was in St Helena, I attended the evening service at the Baptist church. The minister’s text on that occasion was, “Is your destiny sealed, secure and irrevocable?”. That is quite an interesting text for St Helena today. I am not certain that that question can be answered. Is the Department for International Development using its best endeavours at this very important time?
Since we were there 50 weeks ago, I have looked at every release on the St Helena Government website, which is very interesting. One of the features is the comings and goings of various people—people completing a term of three years and going back to the UK, new people coming and so forth. There seems to be a problem with vacancies. I am aware of one very important vacancy, which may now just about have been filled: that of the head of Enterprise St Helena. When we were there 50 weeks ago, we were made aware that the person then occupying the post was about to leave and only now has an appointment been made. Yet it seems that that job is absolutely crucial at this stage. I wonder whether DfID is using its best endeavours.
On the subject of employment, employment opportunities and the comings and goings, is DfID using its best endeavours to encourage the indigenous population and to train people up so that we are not constantly having to get people from the UK who do two or three years and then go back home again, with those who do not like it going home sooner? It would be useful to hear what is happening on that front.
Finally, we have the United Kingdom Government and the important Department for International Development on the one hand and, on the other, the St Helena Government and their arm’s-length agency, Enterprise St Helena. Are the rights, duties, responsibilities, obligations and expectations of each clear? I look forward to the wise words of colleagues who will follow and to those of my noble friend in responding to the debate.
Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville (Con)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Shutt of Greetland—now a considerable authority on the affairs of St Helena—on having secured this debate and on the germaneness of his wording in concentrating our minds. On 31 October last year, I intervened during the gap in a debate, initiated by my noble friend Lady Hooper, on the overseas territories. Today I seek to return to the questions I raised then. It is a pleasure and a coincidence, rather than motivations of egocentricity, which cause me to direct anyone interested in these issues to col. 1787 in the Official Report of that day, in which I alluded to a forebear of mine becoming Governor of the island in precisely the year 1787.
These issues are about how, when tourists arrive at the airport, they can be encouraged to recommend the experience to others through the fruits of improved conservation of both local natural history and Georgian buildings. I did not seek to be plaintive, but I did indicate that I had hitherto had difficulty in finding out how well meaning citizens in this country could assist in this project. The device I deployed through last year’s intervention was extremely successful in that it provoked responses from a worthwhile posse of interested and interesting correspondents. I have spent part of the seven and a half months since then becoming an octogenarian and the rest of the time seeking to put my affairs in order to respond to these intimations of mortality. However, I fear that I have consequently been guilty of discourtesy in not responding to each and every one of these very useful correspondents. I hope that if any of the writers pick up this debate too, they will regard my participation in it as evidence of my continuing interest.
I was especially grateful to the director of the St Helena National Trust for a long e-mail about the trust’s background and functions. I have been tempted to quote from it passim and verbatim but I felt that would be presumptuous without his authority. I would be happy to show the text to those noble Lords interested in the affairs of St Helena hereafter. However, I emphasise that there is no link between the St Helena National Trust and the National Trust in the UK, though both are members of the acronymic INTO, the International National Trusts Organisation, which is based at the National Trust in this country. This long and helpful e-mail, which embraced both the natural heritage and the built environment, went on to furnish an attachment from the St Helena National Trust on the immediate future of the built heritage on St Helena. This is, in the short term, my principal interest and I will return to it to ask a specific question of my noble friend who is replying for Her Majesty’s Government. However, I shall first seize the opportunity to make brief reference to the natural heritage in order to indicate its attractiveness. This comprises, inter alia, the very significant and tiny world populations of the critically endangered wirebird, the spiky yellow woodlouse, the black cabbage tree, the he and she cabbage trees, and other very special fauna and flora, and their natural habitats. I am not going to dwell on them, save to say that great attention has already been paid to them; however, I should declare an interest as a trustee of MEMO, which acronymically derives from the Mass Extinction Monitoring Observatory.
I return to the issue of the built environment, where there is a drawback from the lack of the assignation of responsibility for St Helena’s built heritage to any government department, office or institution. This is a discouraging first impression in the context of the terms of this debate and the concerns for tourism; for it implies no responsibility for these structures, nor yet support for their maintenance. To shine a searchlight on this dilemma, the small NGO that I mentioned is in receipt of a £17,000 annual grant from the St Helena Government, while the two core staff alone require almost £30,000 per annum in salaries. This shortfall’s cure lies with the 4,000 souls on the island and those who come to visit, who are the subject of this debate.
On a more cheerful note, after the initial six-week training exercise last year for Six Saints under Henry Rumbold MBE—a redoubtable heritage stonemason with form on Fountains Abbey and the Prince’s Trust—all six have been assured of their certification within the UK’s NVQ3. In that regard, I should declare another interest as having been a long-term president of COTAC. I am looking forward to hearing whether these skills have been successfully engaged on site. In that regard, the attachment to which I made earlier reference is constructive. There are 967 historic structures recorded in the St Helena Historic Environment Register, with new discoveries daily still to be properly recorded. All these buildings would respond to the care of Mr Rumbold’s six charges and, even more, if intact, would make a lively contribution to the island’s economy.
I am not in a position to report on progress on the Governor’s own initiative in this area, but I will cite the opportunities available to clarify what could be achieved. This is, to some extent, a laundry list: replacing the mass concrete fill of inner courtyard at Plantation House with locally cut island stone flags, repointing the upper storey of the Essex House frontage—the lower storey was properly repointed with a lime mortar four years ago, and completing the partial restoration of Lemon Valley Lower Farmhouse, which was the site for the Six Saints’ training last year.
In parallel, there are structures not in daily public use that need to be brought back into management in a planned programme, which, again inter alia, could be deployed towards tourist use as weekend and short-stay holiday accommodation for island visitors and tourists—which is relevant to this debate. Access, water supply, litter prevention, sewage works and day-to-day control would all help to minimise vandalism.
To identify specific target projects, I refer to Broadway House, which is now let to the trust—the NGO I mentioned—High Knoll Fort’s two major wall collapses, and urgent attention needs to be paid to Munden’s structures that are now slipping away. I shall mention a few more: Bank’s; the steps and railings of the Ladder; Ladder Hill Fort; Munden’s walls and paths; Man and Horse signal station; the Wharf Buildings and mortuary, and the Papanul wreck’s salvaged contents. I have tolled this requiem towards collapse in order the make the point that there is a ready-made programme available to the skills already locally acquired if financial means were available.
This brings me to my question for my noble friend. The 4,000 souls on the island and the present level of tourists will not be enough to capitalise on this opportunity, so the responsibility comes back to us. I have been advised that tax-advantageous devices are being devised to encourage heritage and conservation disciples in this country to make a contribution, which is what prompted my interest in the debate last year. Therefore my query to the Minister is whether Her Majesty’s Government are taking an interest in this domestic venture as regards a conduit, and if so, what progress has been made and in how long a future timeframe.
Lord Jones of Cheltenham (LD)
My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend on securing this important and timely debate. Last month, a ceremony was held at the airport site in St Helena to mark the construction of the airport terminal building. His Excellency the Governor of St Helena opened the ceremony with a speech to the invited guests. In his speech the governor praised the airport construction company, Basil Read, for the marvellous work it is doing. He said:
“Over the past two years when asked about the biggest challenges of my job I have always said that the least of my concerns was construction of the airport. Why? Because it was clear from early on that Deon de Jager and Basil Read were up to the job”.
Other speeches by St Helena officials also praised the airport construction company, Basil Read, and the company’s island director, Deon de Jager, for keeping the project to schedule, budget and specification. It is reassuring to know that the St Helena airport project is proceeding to its completion without any problems serious enough to cause significant delays. That is good news; it is a government project which is not overrunning on cost or timescale.
Our Government were right to decide to build the airport. Currently, St Helena has an odd sort of society made up of grandparents and grandchildren, with the intermediate generation earning a living off-island because there is next to no economy on St Helena. In 2016, there will be the prospect of a tourism industry that may eventually lead to the island becoming self-supporting economically, which will save the British taxpayer tens of millions of pounds each year.
St Helena has many attractions for tourists, some of which we have heard about already. They include Napoleon’s Longwood House, which is a little bit of France on a UK island; 1,100 shipwrecks; spectacular birds and abundant varieties of fish; endemic species of flora—I understand that it is hoped that the St Helena ebony will be made the national flower; the unique St Helena wirebird, which is a kind of plover, which we have already heard about; Jacob’s Ladder, with 699 steps, for those who are a bit fitter than me; Jonathan, the giant tortoise who lives in the grounds of the governor’s residence, Plantation House, who is reputed to be 200 years old and to have met Napoleon; and a golf course with horizontal trees. There is also plenty of history about the appalling slave trade in which the island played a part.
It is vital that we keep it in mind that the airport itself is only the foundation for the hoped-for economic development of St Helena. The goal is to transform St Helena from a small and remote community that is dependent upon grant-in-aid from Her Majesty’s Government to an island which, in time, can become self-sustaining based on a thriving tourism economy. To achieve that goal, the airport is one part of several interrelated and interdependent developments to which my noble friend has already referred to and which are all needed in order for St Helena to achieve at least some degree of economic independence. The airport will, of course, need aeroplanes flying in and taking off. The passengers carried by those aeroplanes will need somewhere to stay. A further aspect directly related to that crucial interdependence between airport, airline and tourism accommodation is the securing of a new shipping service to bring bulk cargo to St Helena. That is needed because the Royal Mail Ship “St Helena”, which the noble Lord and I both travelled on and which has been the lifeline to the island for the past 25 years, is due to be taken out of service after the airport opens.
Each day the airport buildings rise higher from the dust of Prosperous Bay Plain. However, the other vital components remain very much in the early stages of development. The governor of St Helena acknowledged the magnitude of the task ahead in his speech at the ceremony I referred to earlier. He said:
“The more complex, less easy task, is preparing St Helena to be able to benefit from new economic opportunities. But we can do it”.
The acting head of economic development exhorted her listeners,
“to rise to this opportunity and that means all of us working together to grow our economy. To do this we must put business first. This means we must encourage business development, and we must encourage entrepreneurs, both local and overseas”.
With a mere 19 months left before the airport is due to open, progress on developing some parts of the infrastructure for St Helena’s new tourism-based economy have remained virtually static while other parts started to move very late and continue to move slowly. I understand that the first stage of the tendering process for the contract to operate an air service to St Helena will not be completed until 17 July, with the contract scheduled to be awarded in February or March 2015. This gives the successful tenderer no more than one year to successfully complete the job of attracting an adequate number of passengers to a new air service flying to a new and little-known tourism destination.
Beyond that, the technical clearances and ticketing arrangements all have to be resolved at the same time. To attract the number of tourists envisaged, which it is estimated may reach 30,000 a year, there will need to be flights from Europe—the UK and France in particular—as well as from Africa. I hope that the Minister will be able to report significant progress on this, including which airlines have expressed an interest—BA, South African Airways or Atlantic Star, perhaps? When does she anticipate a contract will be signed? The earlier it is signed, the better. This contract-signing could unlock significant inward investment once investors can be assured that flights really are going to arrive.
The other main consideration is accommodation that offers a quality of service for the high-value, low-volume sector of the tourism market that St Helena is aiming to attract. Tourists will need somewhere to stay and so far I understand that no hotel development has started. With completion of the airport just 19 months away, we need to get a move on to build at least one.
Last week at the meeting of the St Helena group, I met two councillors from St Helena—Les Baldwin and Gavin “Eddie Duff” Ellick—who told us that the St Helena Government have set up a company called St Helena Hotel Development Ltd. It would be helpful if the Minister could say something about this. Is the contingency amount for the airport project going to be used to build a hotel? That would make some sense because it could be argued that the hotel is part of the total airport project. In which case, will Basil Read build the hotel? It is already on the island and has a successful track record. Is the Minister able to tell us the situation with Shelco’s plans to build a top of the range eco-hotel? Lastly, I understand that the first stage of the tendering process for the contract for a shipping line for bulk cargo to serve the island after the airport opens will be completed later this month. This contract is scheduled to be awarded in April 2015.
The islanders who are in contact with me are very enthusiastic about the future. I hope the Minister will give credible assurances that Her Majesty’s Government and DfID believe that, as my noble friend Lord Shutt sometimes puts it, “they have all their ducks in a row”.
Finally, many Saints live and work on Ascension and in the Falklands. What progress has been made with the USA over using Ascension as the divert runway for St Helena and on operating a shuttle service between the islands? This would open up the possibility of commercial flights from St Helena and Ascension to the Falklands, thus providing a more complete package for adventurous tourists. In the longer term, have the Government thought about a south Atlantic federation of overseas territories linking St Helena with the Falklands, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha?
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Shutt, for initiating this debate. Building the airport, which is scheduled for completion in 2016, will be a catalyst for change in the island. It provides great opportunities for growth and jobs, but without proper investment the cost of failure will be high. As is common to small islands, St Helena is dependent on importing even basic items. It has a limited economy focused on less than a handful of sectors, a large public service, and as we have heard, hundreds of Saints have left in the last decades to seek opportunities abroad.
As the noble Lord, Lord Jones, reminded us, there is no doubt that we need to support and develop sustainable enterprise if St Helena is to be weaned off that budget support of around £25 million to £30 million a year. This Government reviewed the postponement of the project when they came into office and concluded that, provided certain conditions were met, the best long-term solution from an economic and financial perspective for both Her Majesty’s Government and St Helena was to construct the airport.
The noble Lord, Lord Shutt, said the airport was on time and on budget, but I would be grateful if the Minister would update the Committee on the progress in meeting the specific conditions, not least on handling the risk of cost and time overruns. One other key condition in that decision was for the St Helena Government to implement the reforms needed to open up the island’s economy to inward investment and increased tourism. The opening of the airport, as we have heard, will clearly have a substantial effect on visitor numbers to St Helena, but in the absence of accurate data it is difficult to forecast precisely what the numbers will be. I know both Her Majesty’s Government and the St Helena Government have commissioned a number of studies into the potential demand for travel following the airport opening.
As we have heard, current tourist accommodation on St Helena is severely limited. Meeting the visitor targets relies on the expansion of island resources and hotel capacity, but the infrastructure required to maintain a vibrant tourist industry is not just reliant on hotel rooms—important as that is. I refer to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, about the specific elements of what a successful tourist industry needs to be.
I also refer to Horatio Clare’s excellent article supplied in the Library brief for this debate. He highlighted that without the Caribbean’s beaches or climate, even locals are a little unsure about what a tourist might do on St Helena. One said:
“A mix of walking, fishing, diving, heritage, Napoleon and wildlife”,
which agrees with what the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, said. Even that mixture requires investment, with support to heritage sites and wildlife protection. It also means investment in skills to ensure that the island has people who are qualified to maintain its natural sites of scientific interest, which will be an incredible attraction to the sort of tourists that we seek.
Internet connections are also vital to develop new industries, especially in supporting tourism. As the noble Lord, Lord Shutt, said, the Government are investigating funding and construction options with the aim of completing a hotel around the time of the opening of the airport. We have heard about the development agency that is seeking to work with selected air providers to develop and implement a marketing plan. However, that is all difficult while we do not know who the air supplier is. It will be very difficult to square those things together.
From what I have read in the briefing, it appears that a game of chicken and egg is being played out between the development body and the group of investors with ambitions to build the hotel discussed in this debate. Enterprise St Helena wants the developers to commit to building their hotel so that it can attract airlines. The developers—Shelco—say that the agency should produce an airline before it begins work on the hotel. We have to break that cycle somehow. The Minister wrote at the end of last year that there is an expectation that an agreement will be reached with the airline in early 2015. Like other noble Lords, I would appreciate an update for the Committee on what progress is being made.
As the noble Lord, Lord Jones, said, time is clearly running out on this issue. In January, the Minister reported that passenger numbers for the airport over its first five years would be 14,000, of which 10,200 would be leisure visitors. In May, the noble Lord, Lord Bates, who I am pleased to see here, said that the UK Government expect tourism to be the driver of growth on St Helena once the airport opens. In June, the Minister said in a Written Answer that Enterprise St Helena, the development agency, is leading plans to develop the tourism industry and accommodation. In parallel, ESH is working with local businesses to ensure that the island’s tourist attractions are developed and accredited to international standards. I cannot stress the importance of the points that the noble Lord raised on this particular case.
However, it appears from newspaper reports that there is a little scepticism locally about the projected figures for tourists and the speed at which the necessary infrastructure can be developed. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Shutt, for letting me have sight of the report he referred to from last year’s CPA visit to the island following the general election. For me, an important element of that delegation was that it also embraced representatives from the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Wales. As a point of interest, my own family is from Bermuda so I am familiar with small, remote islands. Some are more beautiful than others, as they say.
When I was at the T&G—the Transport and General Workers’ Union—I also had responsibility for establishing a forum of union membership from the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and Gibraltar. As I said, such territories have many challenges in common. Sharing experiences is important not only to address the issue of isolation—which is an important factor of development in St Helena—but also for looking at how to develop best practice and new opportunities, and see common ways forward, as we saw from the excellent report produced. I am glad it was produced. It highlighted a range of options, not least not to restrict yourself to tourism as other industries need to be built upon.
To conclude, could there be renewed focus in the department to encourage exchanges on best practice, support and information with other Crown dependencies, specifically—obviously, in the case of St Helena—on the development of tourism and new employment opportunities. Could such exchanges embrace the full range of stakeholders in those societies?
Baroness Northover (LD)
My Lords, I start by thanking my noble friend Lord Shutt for initiating today’s debate and for his keen interest in St Helena. In this debate and through other channels he has rightly been a champion for this project and consistently highlighted the very considerable barriers to the development of one of our most isolated overseas territories. I thank other noble Lords who participated in this debate for their contributions, knowledge and engagement.
As noble Lords noted, we took decisive action to address the constraints of St Helena in November 2011 by approving the construction of an airport that would bring to an end 500 years of isolation. I thank my noble friends Lord Jones and Lord Shutt for their tributes to this decision. For the first time in the island’s history, it will be possible to travel to St Helena in less than a day, opening up this beautiful island to the world and providing opportunities for economic development and the enhancement of the lives of its citizens. I take what the noble Lord, Lord Collins, said about the special beauty of many islands, and it is clear that St Helena has much to offer. It is an unspoilt island of dramatic beauty, biodiversity and heritage, as we have just heard. From its fantastic marine wildlife to its diverse landscapes and unique endemic flora and fauna, the island that hosted Napoleon until his death also played a big part in the emancipation of slaves on the south Atlantic trade route. It is one of the most remote inhabited islands in the world and has the potential to attract visitors from around the world.
My noble friend Lord Shutt clearly appreciates, as do other noble Lords, the scale of the challenge for the island’s small population to turn the opportunity that has been granted to them into a reality. I know that when he visited the island in 2013 as leader of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association team, he will have seen at first hand the scale of change needed to transform a community that has been in receipt of budgetary assistance from the UK for over 40 years into one that takes control of its own future. I know that his work was greatly appreciated by the new council.
The airport will impact on every aspect of life in St Helena. With construction work on the airport now at its peak, we have already seen a reverse in the population decline which has had such a marked impact on the social and economic life of the Saints, and which my noble friend Lord Jones so graphically made clear. The continual outflow of the most economically active Saints to employment in the Falklands, Ascension and the UK reduced the population from 5,500 in 1995 to around 3,800 at its lowest point. The airport construction project has seen the population rise again to over 4,500, with the creation of more than 350 jobs for Saints. As the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and others have made clear, the challenge will be retain those Saints once the construction has been completed and to harness the skills they bring to help build up St Helena’s long-term economy. DfID is working closely with the St Helena Government to put in place the building blocks that are required to deliver economic growth. The St Helena Government, with funding from DfID, has established Enterprise St Helena, an arm’s-length body tasked with driving private sector-based growth, helping local businesses respond to increased tourism demands, and stimulating local and overseas investment to ensure that the island is ready to capitalise on improved access.
Securing investment in a new and untested market presents significant challenges. While air access is coming soon, currently it still takes three weeks to visit the island, time that few potential inward investors can afford. Nevertheless, progress has been made. A local developer has completed the construction of eight new rooms in Jamestown, and only last week an inward investor announced the development of 20 wood cabin lodges aimed at the big game fishing market, with construction to commence this year. These are small beginnings, but they are significant in the context of St Helena and are likely to encourage others. Enterprise St Helena is also exploring options for the development of a hotel in Jamestown, building on the island’s unique heritage, mentioned by my noble friend Lord Jones, the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and others, by converting Georgian buildings that are currently being used as government offices into a small, 40 to 65-bedroom hotel. The initial design is under way and the St Helena Government are actively pursuing funding options. DfID is working very closely with Enterprise St Helena and the St Helena Government to support their efforts.
I was asked a number of questions about accommodation and I shall provide some fairly rapid updates. There are currently 41 service rooms on the island, 30 with en-suite facilities. In addition to that there are a number of self-catering establishments, which bring the number of rooms up to 113. Many, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, indicated, may not be at the standard expected by modern travellers at the moment.
I was asked about St Helena Hotel Development Limited. That has been set up to try to kick-start hotel development in Jamestown. Initially it will be wholly owned by the St Helena Government. If plans proceed, shares will also be issued to investment partners. The St Helena Government would look to divest their entire shareholding over time. Clearly, as noble Lords indicated, access, constraints and uncertainties over air services make it challenging to attract private sector investment, but early interest has been shown by two hotel groups. However, both have put plans on hold due to uncertainties in visitor numbers. I have just mentioned the chalets, though, and the plans for Jamestown. DfID itself has no plans to provide funding for hotel development, and it would not be appropriate to use airport contingency funds for a hotel.
I was asked about Shelco. It has revised its proposals to bring forward the development of a 35-room boutique hotel and golf course, with the aim of having it up and running by the time the airport opens. Funding remains an issue, and Basil Read would need to tender for any work that it wanted to undertake.
I was asked about the proposed hotel developments in Ladder Hill and Jamestown. Both Protea Jamestown and Mantis Ladder Hill have put their proposals for hotel development on hold for the reasons that I have given, but the St Helena Government are currently exploring funding options for a medium-sized hotel in Jamestown.
As to when it will be possible to book holidays in St Helena and whether that could happen already, it is of course possible to book the accommodation that I have already mentioned through the tourism office. My noble friend is clearly a forward thinker, way beyond anything that I consider, I am afraid, but we note what he says. He always was extremely well organised.
DfID also supports Enterprise St Helena to offer a range of business advice, training grants and small capital investments to local businesses in the sectors of tourism, hospitality, agriculture and fisheries. We are seeking to give St Helena the opportunity to develop further. It cannot be DfID’s role to undertake each role of that development itself. As my noble friend Lord Shutt indicated, there is mutuality here: DfID is investing in the airport and other areas, and we hope to see a necessary response within the island, including in the conservation skills that my noble friend Lord Brooke has mentioned. Obviously we take the points that he makes very seriously.
Securing air services to support tourism and to maintain access for Saints to travel to and from the island is a key requirement for achieving economic development. Twelve potential service providers have registered early interest, and a formal call for expressions of interest was issued on 12 June.
However, the airport will not just bring economic development. Economic growth on St Helena will mean more jobs and prosperity on the island, reuniting families of Saints who have previously had to travel overseas to find employment. It will mean the potential for faster evacuation in medical emergencies, and easier access to education overseas.
My noble friend Lord Shutt pointed to the difficulties of recruiting staff on the island. He is of course right. DfID is providing £2 million this financial year to provide staff to fill short-term specialist positions that cannot be recruited locally. We support long-term positions in key areas on the island.
My noble friend Lord Brooke highlighted the range of work that could productively be carried out on the island. My noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about a range of skills. Enterprise St Helena, working through the education directorate, has established or is establishing training programmes leading to qualifications covering a wide range of skills. I have a list here. The ones they might be particularly interested in hearing about are building and construction, hospitality and catering, leisure and tourism and environmental conservation. I can go into further detail about them, should the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, in particular, want more on that.
My noble friend Lord Jones asked about a South Atlantic federation. That is very interesting, but it is not currently under consideration. He has lobbed it in, so no doubt people will consider it.
I shall answer some specific questions on the airport as rapidly as possible. I was asked whether it will be possible to fly directly from Europe. The length of the runway on St Helena, unless we flatten St Helena, will not support direct flights to Europe. Johannesburg and Cape Town in South Africa are the nearest international hubs with excellent direct links to most European cities. The current tender for air services will look at all options.
Prequalification questionnaires for the air service are due to be submitted on 17 July. More than 12 potential service providers have downloaded the documents—of course, one of them may have been my noble friend Lord Shutt—and currently five have indicated that they will respond. At this stage of the tender process, it would not be appropriate to name airlines. The current target date for signing a contract for air services is March 2015, but that will depend on the nature of the response received. It is intended that air services to St Helena will be operated on a purely commercial basis and that that should be achieved as early as possible. However, it is recognised that this may be challenging in the early years, and air service providers have been invited to put forward proposals for any required research.
The noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked about risk. The fixed-price, lump-sum contract with risk transferred to the contractor is the arrangement. The airport is now 60% complete and to date is on time and to budget. There is also a temporary jetty at Rupert’s Bay.
Wideawake Airfield on Ascension, as noble Lords will know, is a military airport operated by the US to military standards. It would not be possible to meet minimum civil aviation standards, but we expect that the US will agree to the use of Wideawake as a nominated alternative for flight planning and for domestic services between St Helena and Ascension only. We work very closely with the United States on that.
There will be a limited amount of air freight, and alternative arrangements are being made for sea freight. In fact, the St Helena Government have commenced a tender process to secure post-airport shipping to the island and are expecting to receive expressions of interest this Friday, 11 July.
This is a long-term investment trying to ensure that this dependent territory is less dependant in the future. The business case depends upon not rapid development but slow growth over 25 years. I was asked about the value of cross-learning between islands and development. That is absolutely right. The Joint Ministerial Council is an obvious vehicle for putting that into practice, as is the Overseas Territories Consultative Committee.
The airport is key to the economic development of the island. These are challenging times for St Helena, but they also carry the promise of a brighter future made possible by this airport investment. Noble Lords have very effectively laid out the challenges that St Helena faces and how this new opportunity could and should unlock a transformation of the island and its people in the way we all wish to see.