Tourism

Lord Gordon of Strathblane Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Grand Committee

[Lord Gordon of Strathblane]

My Lords, I join noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Lee, on securing this debate, and I endorse the broad theme that we all feel that tourism should be given a higher priority. Let us take as read the figures which have been given; I want simply to add a gloss or two. First of all, on priority, let us take the example given by the noble Baroness, Lady Bottomley, when she was Secretary of State. It would be useful if every Bill being brought forward by any Government passed a “tourism test” before it could be agreed. Every Government should look at the effect on tourism, our most important industry, before they implement anything, whether that be visa controls or whatever.

The next point I would like to make is about jobs. People tend to forget that jobs in tourism are increasingly becoming high-quality jobs. Chefs are becoming celebrities, while further down the food chain, if that is not too horrible a pun, people in the tourism industry are at least learning to behave well towards others, which surely is a very beneficial outcome. They are also jobs which cannot be replaced abroad or digitised or computerised out of existence. The service industries will always require human beings, so these are jobs for the long term.

Another benefit of tourism which I think is underrated is the benefit to the indigenous population. Let me take a rather extreme example. When I was chairman of the Scottish Tourist Board, I chaired a conference under the auspices of UNESCO in Scotland called “Peace Through Tourism”. One of the speakers was the then David Trimble, who claimed—I am sure that he was exaggerating—that Northern Ireland and Scotland were broadly similar. However, let us give him the benefit of the doubt. He went on to say that the income per capita from tourism in Northern Ireland was one quarter of that of Scotland, and that Northern Ireland’s target of doubling tourism income was not an unreasonable one. Funnily enough, I bumped into him when we were in the Chamber for the vote, and he told me that with the coming of peace, Northern Ireland is well on the way to reaching that target.

Let us look at the effect of the Olympics on Londoners; as a result, they must feel a lot more proud of living in London. It should be hoped that things like the riots that erupted only the previous year are less likely if people feel better about the place they are living in. That is certainly true of my native city of Glasgow. The great thing about promoting Glasgow as a tourist destination is not so much that we have four times the number of four-star beds than we had 15 years ago, but that Glaswegians themselves have started to believe in their own city again. You cannot tell other people that somewhere is a wonderful place without starting to believe it yourself.

I would cite the effect of infrastructure on tourism as well. West End theatres would go bankrupt if we did not have tourism, so Londoners benefit from the fact that the tourist industry subsidises, if you like, their own enjoyment. My son, his wife and my two grandchildren live on the island of Iona, with a total population of around 90 people. However, there is a very good ferry service. Why is that? It is because the island is a tourist destination. The benefits of tourism to indigenous populations are huge.

In conclusion, and bearing in mind that the noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, is to follow me in a few minutes, I would say this by way of compromise on British Summer Time. The current chairman of VisitScotland has advanced the notion that we should adopt British Summer Time on March 1. I know that there are apprehensions in Scotland about the effect of that, but I feel that if we moved BST forward to that date and saw the universal benefit that would deliver, it would pave the way for the adoption of double summer time throughout the country.