Tourism

Lord Bishop of Hereford Excerpts

Thursday 27th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Hereford]

My Lords, together with the noble Lord, Lord Lee, I am delighted to be able to pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, for his excellent maiden speech. I look forward not only to further speeches from him but to the other maiden speeches that follow. Perhaps none of us can compete with the beauty of the area in which the noble Lord had the privilege of representing the constituency.

The diocese of Hereford covers not only Herefordshire but south Shropshire, and I am told that the border country of the Wye Valley claims to have been the place where tourism began. Other noble Lords might wish to contest that, but that is what the people there say, and they do so on the basis that the Wye Valley attracted artists to the area in the 19th century.

I pick up the theme with which the noble Viscount began and others have continued: the opportunities for development and growth in tourism throughout the United Kingdom. Reference has already been made to the number of jobs that could be added—more than 200,000 are anticipated—and to the research; the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, referred to this. It will not surprise your Lordships that I want to connect it to visits to churches.

Forty-five per cent of grade 1 listed buildings in England are churches. That is a staggering number. If any other organisation or institution, apart from the church, was responsible for quite that number, I have no doubt that it would receive more attention. It means, therefore, that we are in the unique position of being able to welcome, as we do, visitors to our churches throughout the country. In our diocese, 71 per cent of the churches I know stay open all the time. They are there to welcome visitors and, indeed, do so free of charge. I am told that more than 70 per cent of the population have visited churches during the past year. Obviously, many have done so for the primary reason of our existence, for worship, but not exclusively or only for that.

Visitors are welcome for all the different reasons why they come. Some come for the architecture, history, beauty and heritage that churches have; and an increasing number, which again will be no surprise, come to explore family history, which has become such an interest for so many. As the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, said, we can host concerts and other cultural activities in our churches and church buildings in Wales. There is also nature and wildlife in our churchyards, and the opportunity that the undisturbed ground provides. The charity, Caring for God’s Acre, which began in our area, stresses that and wants to encourage other churchyards to connect with the work that it does. Churches also provide a place for quiet or silent reflection, spirituality, sacred space, and so on.

In England there are 43 Anglican cathedrals, which between them attract nearly 10 million visitors a year. Again, that is a vast contribution. There are 16,000 Anglican churches in England and the welcome that they give. We do not have the particular statistics, but they are there to encourage visitors and connect with local communities. Again, in our own diocese we are privileged to have so many architectural gems, such as Kilpeck, Abbey Dore, Ludlow and, of course, our own cathedral, which has 200,000 visitors a year. It is more visited than anywhere else in Herefordshire, which in itself emphasises the importance of our churches and cathedrals within the realm of tourism. Perhaps the scope to develop and extend that work is neglected. A cathedral close project in Hereford is the biggest current tourism investment in the county; more than £5 million goes into that. Only last week the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, working with Durham diocese, put forward the twin monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow as the latest UK nomination for World Heritage status. There are nearly 30 World Heritage sites in the UK, four of which involve church buildings. That is yet another way of stressing the importance and contribution that they make.

As I conclude, I wish to emphasise not only the churches’ potential for growth in this regard, as in so many other aspects of tourism in our nation. I imagine I was not alone in being concerned to hear from the noble Viscount how much we have fallen behind France and Germany in the development of tourism in the past few years. I shall therefore end with a question for Her Majesty's Government. How are we to see funding support for tourism in the future, particularly in the post-regional development agency era and without the contributions that it was able to make more locally? Partnership funding for a Herefordshire churches tourism project in my area, sadly, had to stop. That weakens the way in which we can work together so that an area such as this can grow. I would love those aspects to be reversed so that instead of getting weaker, we can not only get stronger but can work more fully in partnership and perhaps speed up the development and rate of growth of tourism in our own United Kingdom.