Tourism minister Barbara Follett has criticised the hospitality industry for being "fixated" with VisitBritain funding, and insisted that the Government contributes far more to tourism.
Speaking exclusively to Caterer, Follett said the true value of the money made available to the tourism and hospitality industry annually was "almost £700m".
The comments came after Tourism Alliance chairman Bob Cotton slammed last week's decision not to provide a one-off 2012 Olympics funding boost to VisitBritain as "short-sighted and damaging".
"All you hear about is the £35m that goes towards VisitBritain, but those are funds for marketing alone. There's plenty that goes into the regions, but sadly people are stuck on the VisitBritain funds," Follett said. "Bob Cotton commented that there was 'no more support for tourism', and that is wrong. There's no more support for the Olympics, but there's certainly a lot of support for tourism in general."
Follett described the industry view that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport did not do enough for tourism as a "sniping attitude".
"I'd like the tourist industry to be more unified," she said. "It actually does pretty well, and is doing well at the moment."
Follett added that the 18% cut in VisitBritain funding between 2008 and 2011 had been made as "there are other ways to market the UK apart from via VisitBritain".
The new tourism minister revealed that she plans to reinstate inter-departmental meetings centred around tourism issues. She will also hold a Regional Development Agency meeting in late February to better direct money held in each area of the UK. "You need eight or nine departments involved as they all touch on tourism, and the regions also have to be included," Follett said.
See more from our exclusive interview with tourism minister Follett in Caterer soon.
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By James Aufenast
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