Wuhan Coronavirus: Tourism

Lord Clark of Windermere Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran]

I thank my noble friend for his question. In everything that we are doing, we are being guided by the Chief Medical Officer in trying to strike a balance between the safety of the public, which is obviously our pre-eminent goal, and making sure that events can take place. There are no rugby events, I understand, scheduled for this weekend. Future scheduling will be based on the best advice at the time. This is a rapidly evolving situation and work is being done on guidance in relation to mass gatherings.

[Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister realise that the cessation of Chinese tourists coming to the Lake District is having a massive effect? But, bearing in mind that there are 19 million visitors to the Lake District and a local population of 40,000, should not the Government be thinking that there will be other dangers like this to the tourist industry that happen overseas? The industry itself should be working with government to think how it can be long-term viable.

[Baroness Barran]

As I tried to explain in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Lee, the Minister for Tourism is working closely with the industry and the Government. As the noble Lord, Lord Clark, will be aware, we recently announced a tourism deal to meet a number of the issues that he rightly raised.