Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she has had discussions with other Government departments on the potential effect of additional public holidays on the tourism industry and the economy.

Bank and public holidays provide an opportunity for people right across the UK to get outside and explore new parts of the country. Domestic, overnight trips make an important contribution to our tourism and hospitality industries, and the wider economy. For example, British residents made 100 million overnight trips in England between April and December 2021, contributing a total of £22.2 billion in spend.

The Inter-Ministerial Group on the Visitor Economy has been established to facilitate greater cooperation across government, in order to assess how best to support the visitor economy, and how to drive growth in the tourism sector.

The Government regularly receives requests for additional bank and public holidays, but we believe that the current pattern of bank holidays is well established and accepted.