Leisure and attractions expert Norman Wallis today welcomed calls to create a new bank holiday this October.
The move is being proposed by official tourist agency VisitBritain to help extend the tourist season for leisure and hospitality businesses and make up for lost earnings from two bank holiday weekends in May lost to the coronavirus shutdown.
VisitBritain believes the new bank holiday could boost the economy by £500million, particularly in tourist towns such as Southport, which welcomed over 9 million visitors last year.
Mr Wallis, who also runs Southport’s anchor visitor attraction, Pleasureland, said that the timing of the holiday would be critical as seasonal attractions could only benefit if it came no later than the October half term.
VisitBritain had projected figures for a British tourism industry worth over £257 billion by 2025 – just under 10% of UK GDP and supporting almost 3.8 million jobs – about 11% of the total UK number before the pandemic hit.
Southport Pleasureland owner Norman Wallis
In Southport, more than 6,500 jobs are dependent on our town’s tourism industry.
Mr Wallis pointed to tourism’s wider impact on the economy, driving revenue through its supply chain and generating an impact over and above direct spending levels.
He said: “There is room for, and reason to, go further to help visitor attractions recover.
“I call on the Government to suspend or radically reduce VAT on rides – something the industry has been lobbying for for some years.”
VisitBritain’s endorsement for the proposed Bank Holiday is based on new findings from the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) that suggest a financial shut down for an additional day would have a positive economic impact.
The government is now considering introducing an extra bank holiday in October, proposed by the tourist agency VisitBritain, partly to compensate for the effects of the Covid-19 lockdown.
Patricia Yates, the acting chief executive of VisitBritain, told MPs on the Commons digital, culture, media and sport committee that the tourism sector expected to lose £37billion from the impact of Covid-19.
Downing Street said the government was “supporting the tourism industry during this challenging time”, and would respond to VisitBritain’s proposal in due course.
A spokesman said: “It is worth acknowledging that an extra bank holiday comes with economic costs.”
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VisitBritain believes there will be a £15billlion drop in income from visitors coming to Britain from overseas, combined with £22billion from lost domestic tourism.
The tourist organisation welcomed the extension of the Government furlough scheme to support businesses which often depend on the summer season for most of their annual income.
Patricia Yates told the committee that businesses in the tourism sector usually begin trading around Easter, and would therefore need to extend their season beyond September to try to recoup some of the lost trade.
She said: “Because the industry has lost the benefit of the two May bank holidays, I think that’s an idea that is being considered, to have an October bank holiday around half-term, because what we are going to need to do is generate people not just in July and August.”
Samantha Richardson, the director of the National Coastal Tourism Academy, told MPs that the majority of residents in Britain’s coastal communities wanted to see tourism return, but that seaside car parks and toilets had not yet been reopened by local authorities, as physical distancing measures would need to be introduced.
Natalie Jamieson-Morrison, who operates Southport Pier along with her family, also supports the idea of creating an October bank holiday this year.
She said: “Yes that would definitely be something we would support and welcome as bank holidays are some of our busiest times of the year, and now we have missed three. It has been an awful start to the season!”
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