Neil Parish MP welcomes record-breaking tourism inbound visit and spend figures that were published by the Office of National Statistic following a letter from the Secretary of State for Culture, Media & Sport:

Dear Colleague  

LATEST TOURISM STATISTICS

I am writing to highlight the publication of record-breaking tourism inbound visit and spend figures that were published by the Office of National Statistics last week (8 May).

In the summer of 2010, the Prime Minister gave a keynote speech which underlined the importance this Government attaches to the tourism industry and its contribution to long term economic growth. Since then, we have seen how tourism growth has resulted in businesses, both in the sector and those that indirectly benefit from its growth, creating more jobs.

Because of the difficult decisions we are taking as part of our long-term economic plan, we have been able to invest over £165 million in the GREAT and other marketing campaigns, including match funding from the private sector. The success of this approach is reflected in the latest ONS inbound and spend figures.

According to those figures, there were 32.81 million visits from overseas in 2013, 6% more than in 2012. This exceeds the previous calendar year record set in 2007 (32.78 million). Overseas visitors also spent £21 billion in 2013, some 13% more in nominal terms than the previous record from 2012. This is the highest seen in any 12 month period in nominal terms, and the first time the £20 billion mark has been passed. In the midst of these figures are a number of things worth highlighting:

• Visits for all main journey purposes showed growth compared to 2012 with the 2013 records largely driven by a particularly strong summer and early autumn.

• Key growth markets like China were also promising, with visits from China increasing by 9.7% from 2012 to 196,000, and spending up 63.8% in nominal terms to nearly £492 million.

• Overnight visits to Scotland and Wales showed increases, with Scottish visits up 9.8% to more than 2.4 million, and Welsh up 3.5% to nearly 0.9 million. Nominal spend was up 19.9% to nearly £1.7 billion in Scotland, and 2% to £353 million in Wales.

• Visits to the rest of England grew by 6.1% to 13.6 million with spend up 15.4% in nominal terms to £7.1 billion. There was also strong growth in visits to cities and towns outside London including Southampton (28.8%), Birmingham (32%), Bath (33.9%) and York (36.1%).

These figures highlight the significant and growing contribution that tourism makes to our economy. Last year’s Deloitte Report forecast that including indirect benefits, tourism contributed £127 billion to the economy in 2013, supporting 3.1 million jobs, bringing greater financial security to hard working families right across the UK.

They also demonstrate the importance of concerted action – across Government, and in partnership with industry to sell our country abroad.

There is more to do, particularly if we are to maximize the benefits of this expanding industry right across the country, but the Government is committed to playing its part.

In March, the Prime Minister announced that there will be two new apprenticeship Trailblazers for Tourism and Hospitality.  And, in Budget 2014, the Chancellor announced the removal of the two highest rates of Air Passenger Duty for long haul flights. This will support tourism to the UK from high value source markets such as China, India, Australia and Brazil.

Growing tourism is an important part of our long term economic plan, and by 2025, Deloitte has forecast that the industry’s contribution will rise to £257 billion, supporting 3.7 million jobs once the indirect impacts of tourism on the wider economy are taken into account.

This makes clear how tourism is a key part of our long-term economic plan to secure a better future for Britain, and by working together, I believe we can take this already world-class industry from strength to strength.

Rt Hon Sajid Javid MP

Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

and Minister for Equalities