Dan Jarvis
Main Page: Dan Jarvis (Labour - Barnsley Central)Department Debates - View all Dan Jarvis's debates with the Leader of the House
(11 years, 8 months ago)
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Hugh Robertson
Absolutely. The great thing about the torch relay was that it gave many places the opportunity to put their tourism assets on display, and I am absolutely delighted that my hon. Friend’s local council is acting in such a fashion.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
There is no doubt that London 2012 has been a fantastic achievement, demonstrating Britain’s unique character. Despite that success, there has been significant concern, especially outside London, that visitor numbers were below those that were predicted. Given that concern, given the Government’s recent commitment to increase the number of overseas visitors from 30 million today to 40 million by 2020 and given that at a time when they should be capitalising on the Olympic tourism legacy they have chosen, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) rightly mentioned, to cut the ministerial post focused on tourism and heritage, will the Minister explain how he will guarantee that every region benefits from UK tourism?
Hugh Robertson
This has to be one of the silliest points made for a very long time. We had a thoroughly excellent Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose), who covered tourism, heritage and gambling. We now have a Minister who covers sport, tourism and gambling. I cannot remotely see that that is in any way a downgrade. There were three responsibilities before and there are three now—the maths are very simple.