BATTLE OF HASTINGS (NINTH CENTENARY) (Hansard, 20 December 1962)

§ Sir Neil Cooper-Key (Hastings)

It is my purpose tonight to raise the subject of a tourist loan to commemorate the ninth centenary of the Battle of Hastings, which will take place in 1966. In an event of this kind there is much that merits support. I think there will be general agreement that it would be boorish to allow an occasion of this kind to pass without adequate recognition. There are two aspects of these celebrations. The narrow and more local one is limited by geography and historical tradition to the area of the Battle of Hastings, the landings, and the historic movements of troops in the area. A committee has already been set up consisting of eleven local authorities and several other interested associations. A strong liaison group is keeping in touch with friends across the Channel. This latter is led by an organisation or society known as Souvenir Normand, which has for many years played a very prominent part in maintaining interest between the south coast ports and Normandy.

The events planned by this local committee consist of, in the first place, a re-enactment of the battle in the form of a pageant on the battlefield. They consider also a tattoo, a sea invasion, a march from York, and a son et lumiere at Hastings Castle. There are other cultural attractions which they have in mind, including an oratorio to be commissioned for 1966. A very strong contact has been made with Glyndebourne and the Sussex Festival Committee. There are many other suggestions deriving from associations in this area of Sussex and Kent seeking to add to the attractions of this area in 1966 and making the season as long as possible. So much for the local aspect of this important year.

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister of State will not be unmindful of the importance to this area of these celebrations. The south coast resorts, because 1596 of the extreme war damage they suffered and the changing fashions of holidaymakers, have not shared in the general national prosperity, and I hope that my right hon. Friend will bear that strongly in mind.

Turning to the wider aspects involved, the tourist trade today is a major money-maker. Visitors to the United Kingdom in 1961 spent £203 million, the fares paid to British carriers amounted to nearly £1 million and the contribution of the travel and tourist industry to our balance of payments was nearly £3 million. Although it is not possible to foresee future trends accurately, three facts stand out clearly. Firstly, the potential value of our tourist earnings will increase greatly by 1966. Secondly, the competition of other countries for this valuable trade will also quicken and be supported in many cases by Government loans and grants which other countries give to their tourist industries, and, thirdly, there is likely to be an increase in the free movement of people in Europe generally, particularly from France; more so if a Channel tunnel or bridge is constructed, and even more so if we enter the European Common Market.

I am suggesting tonight that the Government should seize upon this historical year and build up a period of tourist development within the United Kingdom in this twelve months. This sales campaign could and should be built up around the pageantry of Hastings and the world traveller should be offered during this twelve months the best in culture and entertainment that Windsor, Ffestiniog, Edinburgh, Oxford and Stratford on Avon can offer.

I know that we can look to the British Travel and Holidays Association for support. Those of us who have seen the workings of this organisation, in America, Canada and elsewhere, are full of admiration for the drive which has brought so much foreign currency to this country. Under the able leadership of Lord Mabane and his equally efficient team, this organisation has done tremendous good to build up this very strong balance of payments assistance. But we cannot look to funds from that source.

1597 In a letter dated 3rd September, the President of the Board of Trade wrote to me in reply to my request that a fund should be forthcoming to bolster up the celebrations in 1966. He wrote: The benefit of a Battle of Hastings commemoration would not be sufficiently widespread to justify the Government seeking Parliamentary approval for a special grant from public funds. With respect, I believe that that was a somewhat mistaken view. If the President of the Board of Trade and his colleagues applied themselves with their customary vigour—and their record in the past few years has been first class in this respect—tu make 1966 a bumper tourist year, with the Battle of Hastings ninth centenary as its theme, they could obtain popular support and much financial contribution from private enterprise.

I hope that when my hon. Friend replies he will not just close the door but will consider calling a conference of the various interests likely to be concerned. I am sure that our French friends are only looking for a lead in order to give support to the carrying out of the suggestions I have made tonight.

§ The Minister of State, Board of Trade (Mr. Alan Green)

First, I wish well to my hon. Friends the Members for Hastings (Sir N. Cooper-Key) and for Rye (Mr. Godman Irvine) and the constituencies for which they have spoken tonight. I am glad to hear the tribute paid to the British Travel and Holidays Association. I know that it will be appreciated, and I believe it to be deserved.

Some years ago, historical opinion might have been divided as to whether the event to which my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings refers was a matter for celebration or the reverse. Although 1598 one of the genuinely decisive battles of the world, Hastings was, after all, one of the very few occasions on which an English army was overcome on English soil by a foreign invader. I am told that certain French authorities might be interested in contributing to the proposed celebrations, and I find this quite understandable. Our own interest may be less obvious.

However, historical thought is liable to fluctuation. Today, we are less ready to ascribe all the liberal virtues to our Saxon ancestors and all the qualities of a Victorian hero to Harold Godwinson. Ours is, in fact, a nation of many strands —as the poet put it."Saxon and Norman and Dane"—and I agree entirely with my hon. Friends that some sort of celebration of the events of 1066 is appropriate and important.

I particularly welcome the proposed celebrations because, as Minister of State at the Board of Trade, I have a special interest in the tourist industries in this country and in anything that can be done to attract additional visitors from overseas. Tourist earnings are one of our largest invisible exports. As my hon. Friend said, last year, overseas visitors spent upwards of £203 million—I think that the exact figure is £205 million—in addition to their payments to British carriers.

It looks as though we shall, this year, have something approaching 2 million visitors, 7 per cent. more than in 1961. Year by year since the war, the number of tourists coming here, and the amount they spend, have been going up. I believe that the figures will steadily increase, and I am advised—though this involves looking rather a long way ahead—that the celebrations planned by Hastings for 1966 are likely to be an important tourist draw and to make our final score for that year even higher than it otherwise would be.

Tourist publicity works in a cumulative way and events of this kind can be used not only to publicise the local attractions and to bring visitors to the celebrations themselves, as my hon. Friend pointed out, but also as an advertising theme to increase interest generally in Britain's history and culture and, in a general sense, to promote the interests of this country.

1599 Having said that, however, I must make clear that the Government cannot contribute financially to the celebrations. There are two reasons for this. The first is the difficulty of selecting one particular event of this nature for special assistance. There is no provision in the Board of Trade's Vote from which a grant or loan could be made towards a pageant or mock battle or special event, however great a tourist attraction we might believe it to be. I do not think that we should be justified in seeking authority to do something for this project, when the organisers of a great many other events could probably claim that these were of similar national importance and equally valuable as publicity.

That reason, the danger of creating a precedent, is not of itself over-riding, but our second difficulty is much more fundamental. The Government's concern with the development of tourism to this country is shown through the support which they give to the British Travel and Holidays Association. The steady and gratifying increase in the number of tourists in recent years is to a large extent due to the successful efforts of that association, which is recognised as a leader in its own sphere throughout the world. The Government have given this body central responsibility for the rôle of tourist promotion and the total sum which we think it right to allocate to this task is paid over to the association in the form of grant in aid. This is a quite substantial sum. Last year, it was £1,050,000 and this year, it is £1,400,000. We leave it to the association, as the experts, to use this money in the way which they judge will be the most effective. Having taken that decision, it would be inconsistent for us to attempt to do special jobs of tourist promotion "on the side".

I assure my hon. Friends that the British Travel and Holidays Association is enthusiastic about the battle celebrations. The association has undertaken to give substantial publicity to the festivities in its overseas advertising. At this stage, it is too early to say in exactly what way this scheme would be worked out in an advertising campaign in 1965 or even in 1964. The association believes that it will be able to make a national rather than a local theme of it with the indirect benefits that I have 1600 mentioned. The people in the association are the experts in this matter and this sort of job is right up their street.

As, I am sure, it will be agreed, advertising in the travel world has certain peculiar characteristics. This is because the people who provide the actual goods and services that tourists use are interested not in selling tourism as such, but in selling their own products, and this is perfectly natural. Only a central body with all-embracing interests can deliberately sell the idea of tourism in a certain country or region.

It is for that reason and because of the interest which all Governments have in tourist earnings that all countries which take their tourist industry seriously, as we do, have a central Government-supported organisation to co-ordinate promotional work. This is the primary task of the British Travel and Holidays Association. I know that the Association will be able to apply all its experience in this field to publicise the Battle of Hastings celebrations. In addition, the association will be pleased to put its advice at the disposal of the promoters when they reach the stage of arranging publicity in this country.

The association's job is to publicise Britain and its attractions and it has never felt itself able to dilute its efforts by diverting resources to the provision of financial support for tourist attractions. In these other interests that I have mentioned, the association is willing to help. No doubt, the Celebrations Council will be getting in touch with it when its plans are more firm. I am sure that with this assistance, the celebrations will be a great success. Certainly, I hope that they will be.

It has been suggested that I might sponsor a meeting of interested parties. From what I have said, it will, I hope, be clear that we welcome the proposals of the Celebrations Council and are anxious to do anything we properly can to help. So I certainly do not close my mind to the possibility of arranging such a meeting. I do not, however, claim to be an expert on the technical problems involved either in refighting the Battle of Hastings or in exploiting the year 1966 to the best advantage as a tourist attraction. For this reason, it occurs to me that perhaps a better person to take the chair at such a meeting, 1601 if he could be persuaded to do so, would be the chairman of the British Travel and Holidays Association. I say this without the advantage of any discussion with the chairman, who is at this moment on his way to Australia to look after our promotional efforts there, and of course I cannot commit him in personal terms in any way. I would also suggest that the date of a meeting might with advantage be postponed until a little nearer the time. Perhaps I might discuss the various possibilities with my hon. Friend, which I am very willing to do.

1602 It follows, I think that while I must, with some personal regret, turn down the request for financial assistance from the Government, I cannot close without once more congratulating the promoters on the task that they have taken in hand and promising that we shall be following what they are doing with sympathetic interest, and if I can personally in my own way do anything to help them I will do it. Perhaps this will come out at the meeting to which I have referred.