Examination of Witnesses (Questions 600
- 614)
WEDNESDAY 12 MARCH 2008
MS LYNNE
HOOKINGS, MR
JOHN MILNE
HOME AND
MR MORAY
BOWATER
Q600 Chairman: To us?
Mr Bowater: To you. I listened
to the tape on your website and I also read the transcript. I
cannot remember whether it was Hugh or Tom who answered the question.
Mr Sanders, I think you asked the question and it was a question
which was clearly aimed at asking what the problem was with the
booking system associated with EnglandNet and the answer came
back, "EnglandNet is not a booking system", which is
technically correct, but it was not an open answer to your question.
EnglandNet is the database which sits behind all of VisitBritain's
websites. It is a distribution system. It was set up and built
and the project was originally designed for one main reason and
that was to take bookings online and earn commission for VisitBritain
and generate a revenue stream. EnglandNet sits behind all of the
VisitBritain websites. Am I allowed to quote?
Q601 Chairman: You are allowed to
quote.
Mr Bowater: This is a quote from
the VisitEngland strategy document from Tom Wright to the Board
of VisitEngland dated 29 November 2007: "enjoyengland.com",
which is one of VisitBritain's primary websites, he says on page
two, "will become the primary marketing channel. It will
become the key site for visitors looking to travel in England
with dynamic content changing on a daily basis to encourage repeat
visits and loyalty. There will be much greater visibility of commercial
and bookable products through the site with a clear call to action".
All of that is driven by the EnglandNet database. When we initially
made our complaint to the Commission in 2004, having tried to
explain to VisitBritain why there was a problem, VisitBritain
very quickly closed down the company which at that time was developing
EnglandNet which was called Networks for Tourism. Tom Wright gave
me, as the representative of a consortium of about 45 companies
who were all supporting our complaint, certain assurances that
they would not continue to develop EnglandNet as a booking agent.
Actually, what they did was encourage RDAs, regional Tourist Boards
and local authorities to develop their own websites with booking
engines in them so that they could simply refer the inquiries
down the line to the local authorities where the bookings would
take place on their websites, thereby getting round the State
Aid rules that had been explained to them by the Commission that
they were in breach of. That is the course that they have been
pursuing for the last four years despite a renewal of our complaint
to the Commission in 2006 and an explanation of the reasons why
we wanted to do that. The Commission, I should add, has come back
to VisitBritain and has told them there are extremely serious
issues with the EnglandNet system and the fact of the interoperability
between EnglandNet, regional Tourist Board websites, local authority
websites and what are called destination management systems, which
are funded by the public sector. The State Aid rules on this are
very clear and VisitBritain have encouraged local authorities
and RDAs and regional Tourist Boards to invest in these systems
and it is very likely that the Commission will find them in breach
of the State Aid rules both on the grounds of taking bookings
and also on the inclusion only of accommodation which has been
graded to NQAS. They are going to get into all sorts of trouble
over it.
Q602 Mr Sanders: In a sense, does
EnglandNet unnecessarily duplicate the role of your own company
and perhaps the Tamar Valley Tourism Association and other like
bodies?
Mr Milne Home: We are not a booking
organisation. All I would say about EnglandNet, and I had not
heard of it until I found out you were going to ask questions
on it, is in a way we are the enemy, you might say, as far as
they are concerned because they do not want us to progress into
a booking agency, not that I think we would. I would ask the question,
what in the hell are they doing developing this. If you go on
holiday and you want to go to Cornwall, you type in "Cornwall"
and up comes Cornwall, or "The Tamar Valley, or Looe or Dartmoor"
or whatever it is, you type it in and you go there. What in the
hell are they doing trying to be Big Brother from the centre.
Q603 Mr Sanders: That was actually
the questioning of them in Committee and I was not convinced by
the answers.
Mr Milne Home: I would also make
a comment about money. Nothing comes down to the Tourist Association,
it just gets creamed off on these projects and it is more jobs
for the boys as far as one can make out. Sorry about that.
Q604 Alan Keen: Could I come back
to something that was touched on earlier, which was the branding.
Somebody, I have forgotten who it was now, illustrated how successful
Cornwall has been and there is Cornish this and Cornish that.
Do you agree, therefore, that the RDAs cover too large an area
and it would be better if the money came down to places which
could be identified rather than the RDA saying, "Come to
Southwest England", which does not mean as much as Cornwall
or Devon would?
Ms Hookings: As local operators
we would like it to be much more localised rather than marketing
the whole of the southwest from Land's End up to Gloucester.
Q605 Alan Keen: First of all, you
feel there is not enough money spent on the English regions compared
with Wales and Scotland?
Ms Hookings: Absolutely.
Q606 Alan Keen: You also think in
England, where you are affected, it should not come to an RDA
which says, "Come to the southwest" but to areas much
more focused, like Devon or Cornwall? Before you answer that,
apart from the specific problem both of you at the end have got
with EnglandNet, do you feel that private businesses are not involved
directly enough in what happens to public money?
Ms Hookings: The way I understood
what was said earlier by the previous speakers was that Cornwall
has overtaken Devon in terms of the Wow! factor and drawing people
down into Cornwall. We all know why: Objective 1 money, the fantastic
infrastructure they have now got, the wonderful tourist attractions
they have got, the money they have to spend on their regeneration
schemes, their hotels and everything else, which sadly here in
particular in Torbay we have not had. We have had a little bit
of Objective 2 funding but nothing like the volume of money that
has gone into Cornwall. Because of that they are able to stand
tall, be proud and very bold about offering their product in Cornwall.
In terms of regionalisation, if you were going to the Scilly Isles
for a holiday you would probably zone into the Scilly Isles first
and then you would choose which part of the Scilly Isles you want
to stay at, whichever area I am trying to give as an example.
Devon certainly should have a much stronger brand rather than
just being part of the southwest. I am not undervaluing what Southwest
Tourism do in terms of marketing the southwest but I do think
we have to be a little bit more, not localised but county-ised,
if you like.
Q607 Alan Keen: I have got a Middlesbrough
accent still but I spent 45 years in West London and when I see
the northeast of England marketed, and there are some wonderful
places, some wonderful coastline, I would be more attracted to
something describing Northumberland and the castles and separately
the Yorkshire Moors, which I identify with very well myself. Do
you agree with me that is where the concentration should be, on
smaller units?
Ms Hookings: Yes.
Mr Bowater: Southwest Tourism
have done some interesting research on this and there are a number
of brands that the public recognise in the West Country. One of
them is Cornwall which they recognise as a complete brand; another
is Devon; and, within Devon, Dartmoor is recognised as a brand
and when you say Dartmoor to people they say, "Oh, yes, that's
down in Devon, isn't it?" and it is thought of as a single
thing. There is probably some justification for marketing each
of those areas because they already exist in the minds of our
customers as a separate brand. In fact, Devon County Council have
recently done some work on this and have come up with a Devon
brand, it is just that they have not told very many people about
it, but it is rather good. They have a whole branding strategy,
they have got quite a nice strap line, which I think is "Devon,
a different perspective" or something like that.
Q608 Mr Sanders: Devon `elp us!
Mr Bowater: Devon air! They have
done some work on that and that is simmering along, I suppose.
Q609 Alan Keen: My summary of what
you say is more or less correct, that you want the private sector
to have more direct involvement as well as the local authority,
people who work very hard at it, but you want it more focused
and equal money spent at a national level between Scotland, Wales
and the English regions.
Mr Milne Home: Could I bring it
down slightly from your question. It is very dangerous to have
too centralised an organisation, you do not get the personal touch,
and I believe perhaps that is what has happened in the tourist
industry now, that the destination management people in Cornwall
have never come to me to talk about anything. We have never been
consulted as TAVATA about anything. The drive to get together
with three or four other associations and say let us try and go
green in West Devon and East Cornwall and make something of that
is coming from us, it is not coming from up top. You talk about
the RDA, but they are somewhere up there and they do not impinge
on us at all.
Mr Bowater: They do not even impinge
on us and we are pretty big in comparison to most businesses.
Q610 Alan Keen: So really the tourism
industry, right down to the local level, we all know is very fragmented
and you are saying that not only is the industry fragmented but
those working at a national and then regional levels are fragmented
because they are not representing the views of the people.
Mr Milne Home: They are not talking
to us.
Mr Bowater: They talk to each
other quite a lot.
Ms Hookings: Yes, I would agree.
Q611 Alan Keen: Just one last question.
I am a bit sceptical myself but can you see the Olympics having
any relevance to your area?
Ms Hookings: In Torbay we have
successfully bid for three of the sports and I think that allows—
Q612 Mr Sanders: Five venues.
Ms Hookings: I think that allows
us to go into the training camp brochure or something and we hope
that somebody picks up on Torbay as being a vital place to train
as regards sailing, cycling, judo, et cetera. If we were
lucky enough to be successful in encouraging people down here
and, here we go again, how much money have we got to market it,
how can we get out there and get the people in, then obviously
we are going to benefit. Just on the basis of the Olympics being
in London I would like to think that there is going to be a cascade
effect, London is full and everybody cascades and says, "Hey,
let's get to the coast and enjoy a bit of fresh air". I am
not sure in reality that would happen.
Q613 Chairman: We are going back
to produce a report to DCMS and if you have got one issue each
what would you like us to put in the report, excluding what we
have been working very hard at in the last few minutes?
Mr Bowater: I would say just cut
all of the marketing budgets at a local level. VisitBritain probably
have a role marketing Britain overseas and trying to bring people
in from overseas but I reckon that is just about the only marketing
spend that can be justified, all the rest of it, if it is taken
away, if it is useful will be replaced by the private sector.
My firm belongs to a consortium of holiday firms in Cornwall called
CAHA. It is the big agencies in Cornwall and Devon that have cottages
in Cornwall, and most of them were outside all of the public sector
marketing campaigns we were in, until the rules changed a couple
of years ago and we were shifted out. I cannot say anyone is clamouring
to be back inside those public sector marketing campaigns because
they have not noticed any difference. If our experience is anything
to go by then it is not very valuable. If we felt as a consortium
that there was a need for a destination campaign or a campaign
for "Book a Cottage in Cornwall" or something like that,
then that group could very easily put together the funding to
drive quite a significant campaign. As a firm, we spend over £600,000
a year on marketing, so we are knocking on the doors of some regions,
and South Hams wish they had our money, but together those companies
could easily put together quite a significant marketing campaign.
There is no business case for it. We are all businessmen and there
is no business case for it.
Mr Milne Home: On a slightly different
tack, I would suggest that the number of these agencies, which
all seem to overlap, should be pruned down and those left should
talk to the Association as part of their remit, which they do
not at the moment.
Mr Bowater: It should be run by
the Association, should it not?
Mr Milne Home: It should be run
by the Association, quite right. It would be nice to have some
of those quite substantial budgets flowing a little bit further
down the bureaucratic chain. You end up with someone like us and
Best of Bodmin, Southeast Cornwall, Drake's Dartmoor, we are all
voluntary, we do not get paid a penny, and we are running quite
big organisations. As an honorary secretary, I am probably doing
two or three hours a day on it and you cannot go on like that.
I do not think it is appreciated that we are actually providing
a great service to our people which the paid organisations are
not touching.
Ms Hookings: Torbay Tourism Forum
is not a marketing organisation, deliberately so. We believe in
working in partnership with the people who have the wherewithal
to do marketing. If I can turn that question on its head, so to
speak. Obviously we all need marketing budgets of a value that
are going to make a difference, an impact, and cause people to
come to Great Britain, England, various parts of the country,
but you cannot just throw more and more money at marketing if
the product is not right. If I talk about Torbay, we have got
a wonderful natural environment but our built environment is falling
apart at the seams, as I hope you saw today. Money has to be found
from central Government to support the regeneration of coastal
towns in particular. Torbay Council on its own could never do
it and the private sector do the best they can. You mentioned
where you are staying tonight and you will see the reinvestment
that has gone into the Grand, all private money. We cannot turn
tourism around and we cannot stop the decline, even offering a
quality grading, if the rest of the Bay does not come up to scratch
and is a quality built environment. It is not just down to one
factor at all and it is certainly not down to who spends marketing
money in the best way, you need everything else in place to turn
the fortunes of tourism in Britain around.
Mr Bowater: I could not agree
with that more, that is so spot-on. One bad experience from a
visitor, a shabby street, an overflowing bin, the loos closed
or even if the loos are open someone has taken a penknife to the
wall plate that you wash your hands in. Tourism relies so heavily
on the public environment so much more than any other industry.
It is about the reputation of the public environment in the minds
of visitors. The best marketing that you can do is to make sure
the people who come and stay have a nice time and go back and
tell their friends and family, "It's great, you should go
too" and, guess what, it is free marketing. Everyone else
who lives in the area benefits from the nice, clean streets and
non-shabby roads and all the rest of that investment that is going
into public spaces so you get an uplift in the willingness of
the local community to welcome people as well: "Great, we're
a tourist destination. Look at the place, it's great".
Ms Hookings: We want to put pride
back into our lives.
Mr Bowater: Absolutely. That is
marketing. If you really want to do marketing get the place looking
nice and people having good holidays.
Chairman: Thank you. We have one last
quick question from Adrian Sanders.
Q614 Mr Sanders: This is again on
the statistics. I am determined that everybody is going to agree
on this and it will be a firm recommendation. What statistics
do you and other local businesses and associations collect? Is
this data channelled upwards to the local authority or to a regional
level?
Mr Milne Home: None because it
is something my members really are not interested in, and I do
not have the time.
Ms Hookings: Locally we would
feed into the Devon surveys and if you are members of Southwest
Tourism you would feed into their surveys. What I think is sad,
and with all the experience we have in this country, is I cannot
understand why the Government, I have to say the Government but
VisitBritain if you like, does not develop a monitoring and measuring
system that would suit the purposes. You are looking for facts
and figures to justify your case, to justify the spend, if you
like, but businesses do that within their own four walls. In terms
of what statistics are going to stack up, I think the whole industry
needs guidance from above and that aligns very nicely with what
Europe is going to ask when we go for any bids that are available.
There should be far greater thought put into what statistics are
required from the industry and our role then would be to encourage
all members of the industry to take those five or 10 minutes filling
in those statistics because we are terribly bad at doing that,
and I am not proud of that. I think the industry can encourage
participation when they see that we have gone away from guestimates
and are actually getting some accurate data which will allow better
forecasting and certainly better figures when it comes to what
is needed.
Mr Bowater: We collect statistics
on everything. We track every inquiry, where it came from, how
much that cost. We process it from the first time we hear from
somebody right through to the fifth, sixth, tenth or fifteenth
time they book with us. We have statistics coming out of ears
and it is the lifeblood of the business. Without those statistics
we would not know where to spend money, what was or was not working.
In the past we have provided some of those statistics on a non-attributable
basis to Devon County Council or Southwest Tourism when they have
asked. I have to say we have sort of given up, partly because
we have not been asked and we were maybe the only people who were
giving them any statistics so when the results came out we knew
what they were going to be.
Chairman: I think that is all we have.
Can I thank our three witnesses for their evidence. Can I also
thank all of you who have taken the trouble to come and attend
this evening. The Committee will be publishing the evidence we
have heard on our website within probably a couple of days. We
will be producing a report which will also be published, I would
imagine probably in five or six weeks, and that will go to the
Government and the Government then has 60 days in order to provide
a response to our recommendations. Thank you all very much.
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