House of Commons Hansard Debates for 29 Nov 1996 (pt 18)

Mr. Pendry: The Minister must not mislead the House. I said that we had slipped in the league; of course we have slipped. Our share of the world tourism market has fallen from 6.7 to 5 per cent. We have a £3.5 billion deficit in tourism. The Minister should get his facts clear and should not mislead the House.

Mr. Sproat: The fact is that I have only to quote the words of the right hon. Member for Gorton. He rightly said that the tourism industry is a great success story. There are more visitors, more earnings and a bigger share of the world market, and we are going up in the world league. One cannot ask for much more than that.

My right hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Mr. Aitken) made a point about needing competition between the ferries and the tunnel. He is entirely right. He

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asked whether we could not improve the reception for foreign visitors at Heathrow airport. That is a good and fair point. My noble Friend Lord Inglewood recently went to Heathrow to look at Customs and Excise and immigration procedures. He spoke to Customs officials with a view to helping them in their wish to be even more courteous and friendly by introducing them to the English tourist board's welcome hosts scheme, which is a very good idea. However, we take the point. My noble Friend has done something about it.

My right hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet also made a point about the co-ordination committee. It is absolutely true that the co-ordination committee has not met for five years. Why? The reason is that it was a waste of time. We do not go on with something that is useless; we have a far better way. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State gets on the telephone and says to her colleagues, "This is what I want you to do", and it happens. From my experience of many and many a weary but successful hour spent in the Deregulation Committee, I know that it does more for tourism and taking burdens off the industry's back than ever the co-ordination committee did. Too often, that committee became a talking shop, and that is why we abandoned it. There is, therefore, a very simple answer to my right hon. Friend's point.

I say again to the right hon. Member for Gorton, because the point needs to be understood, that we are looking extremely closely at his Select Committee's report. We understand that it is a non-political Committee and we understand that it has made some extremely important recommendations about extra funding, about registration and about grading. We shall look at each one of the recommendations and come back to the Committee as soon as we have had a chance to give the recommendations the serious consideration they deserve.

The right hon. Gentleman also referred to a second runway at Manchester airport. Manchester is a wonderful airport and I am glad that the Government pursued their liberalising policies for aviation transport. Let us not forget that those policies were totally opposed by Labour Members. I remember that when I was a Minister with responsibility for aviation, we could not get the Opposition to support the privatisation of British Airways or putting the airports out into the private sector or local authority control. The Opposition were entirely against those policies, yet they now urge us to do even more. Well, because we are generous, we shall do so and I shall draw the right hon. Gentleman's comments to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport.

The right hon. Member for Gorton used an excellent phrase when he said that there is a whole United Kingdom outside London. That is true and important. It is a difficult balance to strike because some 55 per cent. of all tourists who visit Britain come to London. Whether we like it or not, London is the single biggest magnet. My right hon. Friend has put another £1.5 million into the London focus campaign so that foreign tourists to London are made aware that they should visit Yorkshire, Scotland, the south-west, Shakespeare country, Cambridge and so on.

Tourists want to visit London first. They know about Buckingham palace, the Tower of London, the museums, galleries and all the cultural benefits that London has to

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offer. As I was born in Scotland and I represent a constituency that is a couple of hours away from London, I agree entirely with the importance of encouraging as many visitors as possible to travel around the country.

My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, East(Mr. Dykes) spoke about the Prince Edward playing fields. I am pleased to inform him that we shall have a meeting on the matter as soon as possible--next week, if he can arrange it. I pay tribute to the persistence with which my hon. Friend has pursued the problem. He also mentioned currency changing booths charging unfair rates of commission. I shall draw that comment to the appropriate authorities.

I was pleased to hear from the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) that the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), who has had surgery recently, is now making a speedy return to health. I am sure that we all look forward to welcoming him back to the House.