Tourism Industry

David Mundell Excerpts

Thursday 20th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)]

Thank you, Sir Edward—I will certainly try. I want to make two general points and then a specific point about my constituency. First, I very much welcome the announcement that the Tour de France will begin in Edinburgh. As I represent a very large constituency in the south of Scotland, it seems to me inevitable that it would have to proceed through my constituency in order to reach England. I therefore make that plea, particularly given that cycling has become so important to the Borders part of my constituency, with the Tweed valley being a world-class mountain biking venue. The mountain biking community has transformed the economy, particularly of the former mill town of Innerleithen.

My second point is a more general one. I think the Government and others can do more to ensure that tourists come out of London. The majority of tourists come into London. We all pass this crowded centre around Parliament and see the streets teeming with people. Of course London has great attractions, but so does the rest of the United Kingdom. We have heard about Dudley and Bedfordshire. We need to encourage tourists to leave London and see the rest of the United Kingdom. In that regard, I hope the Minister and the Government will continue to work with the Scottish Government on their objectives of promoting Scotland. As the Minister would expect, my view is, of course, that it should be Scotland within the United Kingdom, not Scotland as a separate entity, as sometimes they have been moved to suggest.

Like other Members, I obviously advocate the benefits of my constituency. Because it is very large, if I tried to list the attractions and facilities there I would run the risk of missing some, but it is a very scenic, rural area. I am very pleased that Government support is continuing for the Clydesdale Way, which will link cycle and walking routes in the south Lanarkshire part of my constituency, and for the redevelopment of the Crook Inn, a historic inn in the Borders, which will now have a bunkhouse to support walkers and cyclists.

Recently, the Dumfries and Galloway part of my constituency received a disappointing setback when an article appeared in The Times on 26 February by a journalist called Gabriella Bennett, in which she said:

“I hate to say it, but I won’t be rushing back to southwest Scotland.”

Journalists in national newspapers sometimes do not realise the impact they can have on local businesses and communities. The article is not just wrong but ill researched, because Ms Bennett says:

“Once you get to Dumfries and Galloway and moon over the nature, there isn’t an awful lot left.”

Well, she obviously took no time to find out about the plethora of distilleries, art galleries, delis, cafés, restaurants, museums, outdoor activity centres, off-road cycle centres, castles, public gardens, National Trust houses, farm parks, children’s activity centres, history tours, guided art tours, golf courses, independent retailers, the planetarium and book and record shops, to name but a few.

I am delighted to say that there has been a fightback. An article by Jane Morrison-Ross—the chief executive of South of Scotland Enterprise—entitled “Please give southwest Scotland a chance” appeared in The Times in response. She said:

“Dumfries and Galloway has more to offer than cookie-cutter tourism”.

That is exactly the position. It is a unique offering, but it is not the same as the offering that, say, Universal Studios or a historic industrial centre offers to visitors. Each of our communities has something unique to offer, and we should not be disparaged for the fact that we are remote and rural, and that we luxuriate in our rurality, the scenery, the quietness and the natural environment.

However, Dumfries and Galloway has other features, one of which would appeal particularly to the Minister: the new £2 million destination spa at the Cairndale Hotel in Dumfries, which is already attracting national attention as one of the best spas in Scotland. It takes up 1,300 square metres over two floors and features a thermal pool, an aroma steam room, Himalayan salt and infrared saunas, a herbal lounge and a private bathing suite. I know the Minister would be very welcome in those premises.

[Chris Bryant]

Are you inviting me?

[David Mundell]

I am inviting you, because it is a flagship new development in the constituency.

Ellisland farm near Dumfries, which I visited recently, has had a substantial investment of nearly £500,000 from the National Lottery Heritage Fund. That iconic location, which is the former home of Robert Burns, plays a crucial role in Scotland’s history and identity. It will be an immersive visitor experience.

I could go on, Sir Edward, but I will not go on for too long. I will mention the Grey Mare’s Tail, the fact that Moffat is the dark sky town and the eagle town, Annan harbour and Annandale Distillery. Of course, I must mention the iconic Gretna Green, which has been for so long the United Kingdom’s leading wedding venue. If anyone is so minded, there are some very attractive packages on offer. I hope that, in my brief contribution, I have well and truly suggested that Ms Bennett, in her Times article, was completely and utterly wrong about Dumfries and Galloway, and that it is somewhere well worth visiting.

[Sir Edward Leigh (in the Chair)]

I assure my right hon. Friend, on behalf of the whole House, that we love south-west Scotland—almost as much as Dudley.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Creative Industries, Arts and Tourism (Chris Bryant)]

It is a delight to see you in the Chair, Sir Edward. Nobody has yet mentioned Gainsborough Old Hall, one of the most beautiful sights in the country.

I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Blake Stephenson): this is “Blake 2”, the second debate we have had on this subject since he has arrived in the House, so I commend him for his dedication to tourism issues. He congratulated the Government on our commitment to the East-West Rail and the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor, which will be an important driver of growth in his constituency. Many people have said that they simply do not understand why previous Governments did not get round to doing this.

I note the poker face the shadow Minister is adopting at the moment, but he knows, I am afraid, that I cannot go very far in what I can say about Universal Studios. I have said before that the theme park will be absolutely transformational. One of the key aspects that I pointed out to the executives—I met them when they were over a few weeks ago, and hope to meet them again soon—one of the key aspects of the site is that 80% of the population are within two hours’ travel. For both international and UK visitors, it will be a significant addition to our portfolio in the UK and I very much hope that we can get it over the line.

I could take offence at the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire’s demands for a dedicated tourism Minister, but I have decided that he already has one, so that is fine: I am a dedicated tourism Minister, and I am absolutely determined to make sure that we make a difference in this territory. When I was a Back Bencher, I was always calling for new Ministers for this, that, and the other, but one of the things about the UK is that we have more Ministers than France and Germany put together—or, for that matter, Australia, India, and New Zealand put together. The constant demand for separate Ministries can be a mistake, not least because of the connections between issues. As the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) pointed out, the connection between tourism and the creative industries is so significant that I think it would be a mistake to separate them. We need to make sure we are making the big argument on behalf of a very large sector, rather than hiving tourism off to a separate Minister.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Sonia Kumar) has written to me, and I will try to respond as fast as I can. Her idea sounds perfectly good; some of the responsibility for what she talked about lies with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and some lies with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, but there is no reason why we cannot have joined-up Government. If we did, we might have a joined-up geopark, as well, so that is something I will look at for her.

The right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) made a good point about the importance of working with Scotland. Scotland has managed to develop its own brand identity for international tourism—something that other parts of the UK have not done. We need to build on that, so I am happy to work with the Scottish Government. I have already been to a spa in Scotland this year—the right hon. Gentleman was not there—at the Cameron House Resort on Loch Lomond. We went out on a boat in the middle of Loch Lomond on the coldest day imaginable, and yet the glass of champagne was very welcome.

My hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Paul Davies) pointed out that the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale was in the original series of—[Laughter.] No, he and other hon. Members highlighted that visiting places where films and TV programmes have been made is one of the key drivers for both domestic and international tourism, a joy for many people in the UK, and—in a sense—part of why people come here. I have often wondered whether, at Heathrow or any of our ports, we should have an actor greeting people, though I do not know who it should be—Daniel Craig as James Bond, Olivia Coleman, or Adjoa Andoh.

The hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Sarah Bool) referred to Silverstone. It is obviously key to what we in the UK do really well, building on science, innovation and technology—in which we need to do better—as well as sport and tourism.

My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Anna Gelderd)—and what a delight to say “my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall”—made an important point: tourism is great but must be balanced with the other needs of local communities. A community can feel completely denuded because all its accommodation is used for short-term lets that are then empty for large parts of the year. That can be a significant problem, not least because the tourism industry itself needs houses for its workers to live in, so we need to get this right. That is one reason why we want to pursue the legislation introduced by the previous Government on short-term lets; I hope we will be able to do so soon.

The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon)—he is my hon. Friend—made an important point about the character of our people. In the end, tourism is hospitality, and the word “hospitality” comes from a word for a host, or guest. If the host is welcoming—if the character of the people is welcoming—that makes a dramatic difference to the whole tourism offer.

The hon. Member for Richmond Park made several points about the EU, and persuaded me that Brexit was really not a good idea. We are working on many of the issues she referred to, including the question of Creative Europe. In the last few weeks, I have discussed that with a European Commissioner. As the hon. Member may know, there will be a summit on 15 May, and we hope to get to a place of much greater cultural interchange and dismantle some of the friction. That matters to the creative industries and the art market—we are the third largest art market in the world and it has been terribly difficult; if someone owns a Matisse and lives in Italy, the London art market is probably the best place in the world for them to sell it, but following Brexit it has been almost impossible to bring an artwork into the country, sell it and send it on with any kind of ease. I am delighted that only last week the Treasury and DCMS, working together, sorted that out for the British art market.

The UK offers a phenomenal plethora of styles of tourism and visitor experiences. As a former vicar, I think of it as the “Hymns Ancient and Modern”—we do it all. We have the very ancient: Stonehenge is perhaps the most famous in the United Kingdom, but there are many others dotted across the whole country, including way up in the isles of Scotland. We have Roman ruins all over the place, including the Tower of London—although for many people that is associated more with Tudor times. The Natural History Museum has just had some of its best-ever visitor figures, making it the second most visited tourist attraction in the UK after the British Museum. Many people also want to see the Angel of the North, a piece by one of our modern great artists, or to visit the Eden Project or many other places across the UK that are brand-spanking new.

On Tuesday, I was in Bath for English Tourism Week. Bath shows it all. It has the Roman baths, though I did not go in this time—as a Minister, I did not think it would be entirely appropriate to get into my bathers. It is the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth. You can visit Lady Danbury’s house from “Bridgerton”, which is the Holburne Museum, one of many jewels in the crown of our small museums and galleries, which are often not well known and which we need to make more of.

Bath is also going to have a brilliant new £45 million fashion museum in the next few years, building on one of the biggest collections of fashion in the world. If anybody did not manage to go to the DIVA exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum—I am sure the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale went—it was absolutely spectacular and one of the best exhibitions I have ever been to. We have the best castles, in Wales, and probably the best stately homes in the whole of Europe.

We are phenomenally good at putting on live events, including theatre. I do not just mean the London theatre, where we can see some of the best productions in the world and some of the most famous actors live on the stage—I recently saw Rami Malek in a great production of “Oedipus” at the Old Vic; those performances are also probably much cheaper than they would be on Broadway in the United States of America—but in Leeds, Nottingham, Bath and Chichester. All over the country, there are theatres putting on magnificent productions. Of course, we also have comedy, which is often forgotten as part of our creative industries. Leicester is perhaps one of the most famous places that has a festival, but there are many venues all around the country.

We have great music gigs, with Coldplay being one of the most successful live giggers last year, bringing in thousands of pounds. When I met my Italian opposite number in Naples, I asked him, “What can I do for Italy?” He said, “Get me tickets for Oasis.” It is not only about the large venues, with P!nk and Sam Fender, for instance, performing in Newcastle and at the Stadium of Light. It is also about the small venues; FKA twigs is performing in a tiny venue tomorrow night, to just 200 people. For many, that is just as important as the big venues.

Then there is football. The right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale also referred to the Tour de France. Sport in general is a very important part of the way we do our tourism.

Of course, there is our nature. We have already heard reference to the Lake district; there are also the Munros in Scotland, the Jurassic coast, the Llŷn peninsula, the Gower peninsula, and one of my favourites, Lindisfarne, which is perhaps one of the most beautiful, sacred and holy places in the whole of our country and in Europe.

What do we need to do? Many Members have referred to the fact that we need to get to 50 million international visitors by 2030. That is money coming into the UK— earning foreign cash is really important. We have to have a national strategy. We have never had one before. If I manage to get this national strategy to pass, I hope that the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire will withdraw his demand for the sacking of this Minister and for having a dedicated one. We have set up a visitor economy council, which has had its first meeting; we have sub-committees working away on specific elements. We are going to have a bigger council meeting with a wider working conference in a couple of weeks’ time in Birmingham.

We need to improve the end-to-end visit. I wonder if any hon. Members have got off a plane at Gatwick recently and tried to get on a train. I defy anybody, unless they have three PhDs—actually, it is probably even worse for those who have three PhDs—to understand the right train to get on at Gatwick, and the right ticket. We need to make these experiences far easier. Leeds station is also completely incomprehensible. I have no idea how to get out of the station. It is a completely impossible conundrum. We need to improve that.

We need to get better at languages so that all the languages that international visitors might need are available not only in Bicester Village, but in many other places across the whole of the United Kingdom, because that is a part of our welcome.

I would love us to be able to sort out a decent transport system to Stratford-upon-Avon. It is one of the great places for many millions to visit—for many reasons as well as the theatre and the connection to Shakespeare. There is great hospitality there, but it is very difficult to get to by public transport.

We need to address the skills shortage and probably the labour shortage, which may go to one of the points that was made earlier by the Liberal Democrats. I am passionate about this. There are many countries in the world where people think that working in hospitality is not just a job that they might do because there is nothing else to do, but that it is a career that they take real pride in. Someone might be a waiter all their life because they are in a service industry that they care passionately about, and they love engaging with people and making sure that they have a good evening. Yes, we need to do more about that. That is why I want to create—in this Parliament, if possible—five centres of excellence for hospitality in the United Kingdom to match those anywhere else in the world, so that people know that we really do this well. They would cover not only skills that might be taught at a local college, but those relating to running a hotel business, management, marketing and all the elements that make for really good tourism.

The hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire referred to all 650 constituencies—well, he is right. We already have 38 local visitor economy partnerships in England. They cover nearly all of England but, oddly enough, not his patch. We really want to develop them across the whole of England and build a full national strategy with the home nations. I am fascinated by the destination development partnerships that have been growing up in, for example, the north-east; they bind together a whole region to address issues that cannot be addressed town by town.

I want a real welcome and a quality experience for every single person, whether they are a domestic visitor or otherwise. We have to look specifically at the issues that affect coastal areas—historic areas where people used to go on holiday in this country, but now do so less. We also have to do something about mobile coverage, which is just embarrassing. I was in Godalming the other day, and there was absolutely no mobile coverage in the centre of town. I could not even park my car because I could not download an app to do so, let alone find my way to Busbridge village hall, which I was trying to find.

We need to be proud of our food and drink. I am passionate about that. We have better cheese and sparkling wine than France—it is categorically proven now. I love Italy in many ways, but it has only one pudding: tiramisu. We have Sussex pond pudding, jam roly-poly, apple pie, apple dumpling, apple crumble, apple cobbler, Bakewell tart, bread and butter pudding, summer pudding, queen of puddings, banoffee pie, Eton mess, Eve’s pudding, tipsy laird, cranachan, treacle tart, figgy pudding, junket—I have had lots of that—lardy cake, knickerbocker glory, rice pudding, Shrewsbury cake and spotted dick, and that is to say nothing about trifle. We can beat the world when it comes to puddings and food, and we should be proud of that.

[David Mundell]

I am very disappointed that the Minister missed out Ecclefechan tart, which is a delicacy from the community of Ecclefechan in my constituency—it is a treacle-based tart.

[Chris Bryant]

That is only because I had written it down but could not read my handwriting.

I want to say two final things. First, of course I recognise the problems that the industry faces, and I am seeking to address many of them. There are two ways of looking at what we have done for the hospitality industry. Obviously, it had 70% relief on business rates, but that was not guaranteed for the future. It was going to go down to zero, but we are committed to keeping it at 40%; that is important.

I accept that there are difficulties for many in relation to the minimum wage. I still think it is important that we pay people properly in this industry, because that is part of changing the industry into one with not just jobs but careers in which people can take pride. Of course, I recognise that the national insurance contributions will be a significant cost for many, but we need to bear in mind the additional expenditure that we are able to bring to bear on so many aspects of the British economy and our public services through the money that that will bring in.

Finally, we need to embrace our history better. There are lots of things that we do magnificently when we talk about our history. Television programmes like “Wolf Hall” enhance that, and that is brilliant and wonderful. We have a responsibility for our museums and galleries. Sometimes places like the British Museum are able to show, unlike any other museum in the world, the whole of the world to the world, and that is a great opportunity.

Lord Ashcroft has a phenomenal collection of Victoria Crosses—the largest in the world. They have been sitting in the Imperial War Museum for a while and have been very well attended. Everybody absolutely adores not just the medals themselves but the stories behind them. I am passionate about trying to find a new home for that collection. I have been talking to Lord Ashcroft and I am determined to find one. If anyone in the room has any ideas about how we could find a new home for that Victoria Cross collection, please do get in touch. I know that there will be people from across the Commonwealth and the whole world who want to see the collection in a permanent home. With that, I commend the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire on this debate and beg that he withdraw his demand that I be sacked.