HC Deb 15 September 2004 vol 424 cc1594-5W
Brian Cotter

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what the level of Government grant in aid was to each regional tourist board in England in each year since 1997 (a) per head of population and (b) in real terms; and what the proportion was of (i) overseas and (ii) domestic tourists in England in each regional tourist board area in the same period. [188666]

Mr. Caborn

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) provided grant in aid to the English Tourism Council (ETC, formerly the English Tourist Board) between 1997–98 and 2002–03. Grant in aid was paid by the ETC to the Regional Tourist Boards (RTBs) as shown in the following table:

Grant in aid in 2003–04
Regional Development Agency1 £000
North West 713
1In 2001–02 and 2002–03, £1.9 million p.a. was passed from DCMS to the Greater London Authority (GLA). As well as £1.5 million for the promotion of London overseas as a destination and as a gateway to the rest of the UK, this included £400,000 for the development of tourism infrastructure, equivalent to the funding formerly passed to the London Tourist Board via the ETC. This funding is maintained under the current DCMS-GLA Agreement for 2003–06. £1.9 million passed to the GLA in 2003–04.

Grant in aid per head of the resident population for each Regional Tourism Board area is shown in the following table:

1Population Trends provides population figures for the standard administrative Government Office Regions (GORs). These are not identical to the areas covered by the RTBs but have been used as the best available approximation. It was necessary to combine North West and Cumbria, and also Southern and South East, to match the GOR figures.
Source:
Population Trends

The proportion of overnight tourism visits to each region1 is shown in the following table:

1The International Passenger Survey and UK Tourism Survey
Percentage
Proportion of total domestic tourism visits Proportion of total overseas tourism visits
Tourism Board 2000 2001 2002 2000 2001 2002
East of England 9 10 11 7 6 7
Heart of England 17 17 18 9 9 11
London 13 13 12 51 50 48
Northumbria 8 7 7 2 2 2
North West and Cumbria 11 10 11 6 6 6
Tourism South East 19 20 19 16 17 16
South West 13 15 15 6 6 6
Yorkshire 9 8 9 4 4 4
Note:
Regional UK Tourism Survey data is only available on a consistent basis back to 2000 due to a major change in the survey methodology.
Source:
International Passenger Survey, UK Tourism Survey.

Brian Cotter

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what the level of Government grant in aid was to the English Tourism Council in each year since 2000. [188742]

Mr. Caborn

In April 2003, functions of the British Tourist Authority and the English Tourism Council (ETC) were merged to form VisitBritain. Grant in aid for the ETC for the period 2000–03 was as follows:

Grant in aid to ETC
£ million
2000–01 11
2001–02 9.6
2002–03 11.6

In addition, £3.8 million was awarded to the ETC in 2001–02 and further £1 million in 2002–03 from the Reserve to help tourism recover from the impact of foot and mouth and the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. In 2002–03, the ETC was also awarded £3.6 million over two years from the Invest to Save Budget to support the development of the EnglandNet project to establish an on-line tourism network for England.

Grant in aid allocation to VisitBritain for the domestic marketing of England was £10 million in 2003–04 and £12.9 million is available for 2004–05.

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