Examination of Witnesses (Questions 220-234)
MR COLIN
DAWSON, MR
PHILIP MILLER
MBE, MR MICHAEL
BEDINGFIELD AND
MR STUART
BARROW
11 JULY 2006
Q220 Mr Betts: Do you do surveys
afterwards to find how successful that has been?
Mr Bedingfield: Absolutely, yes.
Q221 Mr Betts: It is possible to
have any information about those as well?
Mr Bedingfield: Yes, we can do
that.
Q222 Mr Betts: Let me turn to BALPPA.
You suggest in your evidence that a specific scheme to help coastal
regions would be helpful. Given that we have just been talking
about the diversity of all the different coastal resorts and towns
and cities, would a scheme really be helpful or are you talking
about a variety of schemes that could be pulled together or targeted
at appropriate locations?
Mr Dawson: Yes. I think schemes
as a strategy are that what we are trying to identify here. There
is a need for the various agencies and the RDAs to be pulled together
to concentrate their efforts with a partnership between the public
sector and the private sector that moves things forward because
all too often, certainly from the private sector perspective,
it is not always simple to identify where you should go in order
to make things happen. We have had a classic example in Southend
where all the money that has been spent down there so far has
been from the private sector but there are more opportunities
down there, as there are in numerous other places around the coast,
where more could be done to invigorate and rejuvenate tourism.
Q223 Mr Betts: Who is going to be
pulling it all together? Is it a central Government responsibility
or do you think some of the RDAs should be involved?
Mr Dawson: I think there has to
be guidance from the Government on a national strategy that pulls
the thing together. All too often now they are dispersed and they
are operating individually.
Q224 Mr Betts: I am not quite certain
I am getting the flavour of this. We have talked about a national
strategy but then we are talking about the fact that every town,
every city on the coast is very different.
Mr Dawson: Yes, but that is why
it would have to go down through the regional bodies. What I am
saying is that there is insufficient guidance to the regions for
them to concentrate their efforts. They need that guidance. There
needs to be a policy from national government which says, "This
is the strategy and you will follow it", and that comes down
through the regions so that the region then takes that on board
and works with the partnerships in the area, private and public
sector, to make things happen.
Q225 Chair: Is that your view, Mr
Miller?
Mr Miller: I can give you a few
examples in Southend. We have got various grants from various
bodies. We have had Thames Gateway give us some money for a big
scheme. Objective 2 have given money for the high street. We have
had a small amount of lottery money for the cliffs. If we could
talk about the cliffs, at the moment they are in danger of bowling
into the sea. They are a big threat to the local economy, let
alone the people. We have had one collapse and we have had a £35
million estimate come along that the council have not got any
money for but in the meantime they are spending £6 million
or £7 million on one scheme not too far away, another £10
million or £15 million somewhere else of this grant money,
and the people of Southend are saying, "Why are you doing
that when this is the most desperate, horrific business here?",
because it is a danger to people's homes. That is a classic example.
Instead of having all this money where the council is given the
opportunity to bid for the money and they have to meet these criteria
in a short space of time, where they really want it they would
like to divert it there.
Q226 Chair: Are you saying there
is a lack of an overall strategy?
Mr Miller: Totally, yes.
Q227 John Cummings: I am rather surprised
that none of the witnesses has made any reference to the present
debacle with the provision of casinos. Do you see the provision
of casinos being very high? Will it help the regeneration of seaside
towns? How do you view the way in which the legislation is being
shoved through the washing machine at the present time?
Mr Dawson: I think the regional
casino does offer opportunities for regeneration of coastal towns
but, going down the scale to the small and large casino, I do
not think it offers anything. In fact there is a great problem
of transference of business from the coastal arcades that have
been the tradition in this country for so many years to the smaller
and larger casinos. With the regional casino, of which one is
currently planned, we know not where, that is a totally different
operation because that has very significant leisure and hotel
support, and that is definitely an opportunity to regenerate a
town.
Q228 John Cummings: Do you feel the
same way?
Mr Bedingfield: I agree.
Mr Miller: I do not; only in certain
places. In Southend we all breathed a big sigh of relief when
we did not get it, the people that live there. The council has
one view but the residents—and there are a lot of businesses—have
a completely different one. It just would not have worked in Southend.
We have not got the car parking, we have not got the infrastructure.
If you look at the Blackpool model it is absolutely perfect for
them. Let them have it, please do.
Q229 Mr Betts: Sheffield wants it
too.
Mr Miller: Have two. I am not
against casinos per se. I do not mind them at all. I even
got married in one.
Mr Dawson: So if we gave the impression
it was within our gift it certainly is not.
Mr Miller: It is no good living
in a nice town if you cannot get around it. Southend is in good
luck already. If you suddenly have these hundreds of thousands
of people coming to these casinos where are you going to put them?
Where are you going to park them? We just have not got it.
Q230 Sir Paul Beresford: Let me take
you back a little bit to the question before the last one. The
problem with national guidance is that it must be national and
it has to apply across the board but in your particular cases
the most striking thing is the variety of the towns. Do you want
guidance or do you actually want more freedom?
Mr Dawson: No, I think it is guidance,
because without the guidance what is happening at the moment is—
Q231 Sir Paul Beresford: What is
the guidance going to say?
Mr Dawson: I will give you an
example. We have just had the tourism policy guidance. That is
a classic example which is pointing out to local authorities that
when you consider planning applications for tourism destinations
this is what you should be considering. It is that sort of guidance
that is bringing a focus into tourism which previously did not
exist. That is what I am talking about. Mr Betts made a classic
example just now when he said that the brief of RDAs is extremely
wide and as a consequence of that tourism gets pushed to the end,
if it is there at all. In many cases there is no tourism represented
in the RDAs at all. That is the sort of policy guidance that I
would like to see.
Q232 Mr Betts: If I can turn to VisitBritain,
how well do you think Government departments work with you and
listen to you about making sure that regeneration developments
are linked into tourism and the needs of that industry?
Mr Barrow: There has certainly
been much interest in an initiative such as Liverpool winning
Capital of Culture 2008 or the Olympics or many events that will
help us promote Britain internationally as a tourist destination.
Local government is quite responsive to the need to attract tourists
to the local economy. We are very worried that the Lyons review
might suggest a bed tax on tourism which we think would be detrimental
to the tourist trade, but in general we feel that the Government
is supportive of the tourist industry. It is one of our biggest
industries after all, £74 billion a year.
Q233 Chair: Can I ask you about the
bed tax routine? Might it not make some local authorities rather
more enthusiastic about promoting tourism if they thought it was
going to bring in income, because one of the points that has been
made to us by local authorities is that from the point of view
of a council tourism may increase their costs enormously without
giving them as a council any additional income whatsoever.
Mr Barrow: If those local authorities
that have publicly said they are against the idea, such as Bournemouth,
do not impose a bed tax but other local authorities do, then Bournemouth,
which is already a popular tourist destination, is going to become
relatively more attractive than those that want to promote more
tourism to their area. It is a bizarre way to try and attract
visitors by making them pay more.
Q234 Chair: Unless it might be seen
as a way of mobilising funds to maintain the public fabric which
we are told is what attracts people to seaside resorts.
Mr Barrow: Which is exactly what
they thought would happen in the Balearic Islands when they imposed
an eco tax on tourists, and they have had to abandon it because
they saw a big drop in tourism to the Balearic Islands.
Chair: Thank you very much indeed. If,
when you disappear, you think of something you should have said,
drop us a note.
| 
