HC Deb 25 February 2002 vol 380 cc874-6W
Dr. Cable

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what estimate her Department has made of the level of tourism exports in the last five years from each region of the country. [35304]

Dr. Howells

I have been asked to reply.

Tourism exports are largely comprised of expenditure by overseas residents during visits to the United Kingdom. Data on this are available from the International Passenger Survey.

Expenditure by overseas' residents during visits to the UK is shown in the table. These data cover the years of 1996 to 2000 for Regional Tourist Board areas in England and for the countries of the United Kingdom. Regional data for 2001 will be available in May 2002.

Spending by overseas' residents during visits to the UK
£ million
Tourist board region/country 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000
London 6,007 5,993 6,298 6,760 6,901
Northumbria 158 190 129 167 169
Cumbria 58 59 45 67 52
North West 381 455 395 441 448
Yorkshire 280 304 286 264 259
Heart of England 646 640 624 704 771

Spending by overseas' residents during visits to the UK
£ million
Tourist board region/country 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000
East of England 510 531 585 575 683
West Country 518 477 494 485 553
Southern 739 702 773 797 775
South East England 699 662 827 755 705
All England1 9,998 10,026 10,468 11,030 11,359
Wales 198 210 164 269 267
Scotland 839 799 882 817 789
Northern Ireland2 n/a n/a n/a n/a 107
UK1 11,244 11,275 11,723 12,370 12,672
1 Figures may not sum due to spending not attributable to regions/countries, e.g. in 2000 £110 million was spent on day trips to the UK but was not allocated to region/countries of the UK for reasons of questionnaire simplicity.
2 Comparable data not available.

Source:

International Passenger Survey, Office for National Statistics