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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he is taking to encourage (a) UK and (b) overseas citizens to take holidays in UK (i) seaside towns and (b) coastal communities.

VisitBritain and VisitEngland are responsible for promoting the UK as a tourist destination, which it does through a range of different initiatives and campaigns. VB sit on the Coastal Tourism Leadership Forum (run by the National Coastal Tourism Academy), helping to shape the Coastal Visitor Economy Vision and Action Plan. DCMS are observers at the forum.

One of the projects currently being supported by the £40m VisitEngland Discover England Fund is the South West Coastal Path, which is promoting the path to the Dutch and German market.

Government recently published the Tourism Sector Deal which aims to improve the sector’s productivity and ready our visitor economy for the visitors of the future.