Tourism Inquiry
Item 3 is the tourism inquiry, and members should have received a copy of a further response from the Scottish Government. One suggested action is that we write to the Minister for Enterprise, Energy and Tourism to thank him for his new response, to ask to be kept up to date on the implementation of the agreed recommendations at suitable intervals over the coming months, and to ask for details of which organisations and individuals will be responsible for taking forward some of the committee's recommendations on the minister's behalf. That will make it easier for us to track progress.
Do members have any comments?
I am happy with that suggestion, but we should also consider in detail the responses in which the minister has declined to accept the committee's recommendations. I have concerns about them.
The response to paragraph 251 of the committee's report, on modern apprenticeships, is still unsatisfactory. It refers to
"the most appropriate training interventions, which may or may not be"
modern apprenticeships. The committee specifically asked the minister to consider the point on modern apprenticeships, and thus far he has declined to do that.
The minister gave the impression in the debate on the report that he was inclined to support the proposal that there should be a joint ticketing summit involving those involved in transport and tourist attractions. I am disappointed that in his response on paragraph 272 he appears not to indicate any intention to take that forward.
Finally, let me deal with paragraph 274, which is referred to on the last page of the minister's reply. I draw attention to a common feature in one or two of the responses, which is that the minister makes the judgment that some committee recommendations are not committee recommendations. As we discussed previously, I presume that that is because they were not indicated in bold type. However, they were nonetheless the views and recommendations of the committee, and I am a little surprised that, having been asked about them a second time, the minister does not agree. We should be clear in our response that all the recommendations that we made in the report were recommendations agreed by the committee.
The specific question relates to international visitors at Aberdeen airport. As the minister says, responsibility for recording their numbers lies with the Office for National Statistics. Our recommendations asked that the minister support the view that visitors to places other than Glasgow, Edinburgh and Prestwick should be counted, but his reply fails to indicate a willingness to work with us on that. Ministers sometimes appear to be keen to take up issues with UK-wide bodies, and this is one occasion on which a Scottish Parliament committee has asked the minister to do that. I hope that he will respond positively.
There is a purpose behind the recording of those visitors. We know from VisitScotland's evidence that it pays attention to the statistics in determining where to make investments and which sectors and markets should be given priority. Aberdeen airport, for example, receives a significant number of tourists from Scandinavia, and a concern was raised that some of them are undercounted because Aberdeen is undercounted. There may be similar issues now at Inverness and in other places that have an increasing number of international visitors. We should return to the minister to say that we would welcome his support in making that case to the Office for National Statistics.
I support Lewis Macdonald in pushing the minister on the need for accurate statistics. In the evidence that we took, there was support for that throughout the industry.
On the issue of modern apprenticeships, as covered by paragraph 251, I am disappointed in the minister's response. I accept that
"SDS is consulting with training providers and People 1st to get the views of employers and training providers on the potential for improvements in training provision"
in the tourism industry, but why pick on the tourism industry by stopping the provision completely? That is what has happened with funding for adult modern apprenticeships in tourism. When a review is in progress, surely to goodness we should not stop a qualification that has been successful. Modern apprenticeships in all sectors have been deemed successful in getting young people who do not want to go to university into vocational training, with a structured, business-led, work-based approach that is supported by further and higher education.
I cannot understand why the Government has taken that approach, and we should ask about it. Why, before we have any results, are we significantly cutting spending on tourism training? I am worried by that. We are not training any adults in modern apprenticeships, and I do not think that the Government's arguments add up.
I have two points to make, one on paragraph 236 and another on paragraph 269. Paragraph 236 is about the relationships between Historic Scotland and the tourism industry. I have received a letter from the historiographer royal in Scotland, Christopher Smout, expressing some concern and arguing for the retention of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland, which is threatened with being absorbed by Historic Scotland. The remits of the two bodies are quite different. In a tourism sense, the RCAHMS—unwieldy as it might sound—represents the cutting edge of archaeology in Scotland and of historical research, which is in itself a substantial tourist attraction. I would be very worried if that body, which is led by experts, were to become absorbed into an organisation whose activities might come to be determined by commercial goals.
We are perhaps straying as far as this committee's remit is concerned.
We are straying; on the other hand, I think that archaeology and the frontier of the past, which Scotland represents, is a huge selling point for the country.
My other point is that the railway system continues to give grave cause for concern. I was travelling down to London last weekend, and I found myself confronted by two journeys of more than six hours, because of diversions caused by work to improve the rail infrastructure. The trouble is that that has been the case for the past 13 years. A journey back and forth on either the east coast main line or the west coast main line is still marked by huge delays practically every weekend, and it is not getting any better. A lot of people using runabout tickets and so on will simply not come to Scotland, or they will fly—and even that is subject to mounting expense.
Without reopening the debate on all the detail, I point out that the Minister for Enterprise, Energy and Tourism will be with us next week, and it would be possible, under our consideration of the budget, to ask him some questions directly on those matters.
It is clear that the minister has made decisions on certain matters, and I am conscious that we might just end up batting things back and forth: we say what we think the minister should do, and the minister writes back and says, "No, this is what we are doing."
I would like us to follow up on two issues. One is covered by paragraph 248, and relates to a task group bringing together employers and training organisations to consider levels of skills and qualifications. We had a stark evidence-taking session on that. Everyone on the committee was struck by the disconnect between those employers who provide training and courses and those who need to do that. That was possibly the best evidence session that we had.
In our letter to the minister, we suggested that the industry should be represented on the task group. The minister responded by listing the organisations that have been invited. Other than the Scottish Tourism Forum, the industry is not represented by any employers, despite the minister's statement that:
"The industry will be well represented on the Group".
The Government has made up its mind about who should be included in the group. However, it would be legitimate for us to ask for a list of those in the industry who gave or submitted evidence to the group. I request that we do so, because unless we get the two sides together there will be no change.
My second point relates to paragraph 254 of the report, on free software. The committee's view was that web in a box software should be given to all tourism companies that want it, but the minister is not minded to do that. About halfway down the paragraph in which he responds to the suggestion, he states:
"Suitable software for website establishment and web-booking is available from several sources at no cost."
It would be hugely helpful if the minister could identify those sources for us, so that we can tell tourism companies in our constituencies and areas where they are. Let us tell the industry about the service, so that they can access it. I request that we write to the minister seeking further details on the two issues that I have raised.
My comments are on similar lines to those of Gavin Brown. It is not useful for us to return to the issue once in every couple of meetings—we should not knock things back and forth for ever more, which we could easily do.
Lewis Macdonald made the point that some recommendations have not been treated as recommendations, but if we had wanted them to be treated as recommendations, we would have used the phrase "We recommend" and put them in bold. It is not helpful for the member to focus on such issues. The minister responded to the points that we made, although he said that they were not recommendations.
A task group on qualifications is to be set up. I agree with Gavin Brown that the committee identified a lack of real leadership in the industry, because it is diverse and scattered. The Scottish Tourism Forum is the only body that comes anywhere near to being a voice for the industry. We recommended that the industry get its act together to develop the forum, so that it has a proper voice. It would be good for a number of people from the industry, not just one representative of the Scottish Tourism Forum, to be included in the task group, as the industry's voice needs to be a bit louder. I am not exactly sure how to make that happen, because of the way in which the industry is dispersed.
The clerks have made a note of members' points. We need to get one or two matters clarified and will try to do so. I have suggested one means of doing that—asking the minister directly. If we bat the report back and forward, it may become a constant item on our agenda, which would not be very practical. With members' permission, we will use the points that they have made to make an approach to the minister, through the clerks.
Dave Thompson suggested that some of the recommendations that we made were not recommendations, because they did not appear in bold. Paragraph 274 of the report states:
"Furthermore, the Committee wishes to see key data, such as the international passenger survey, record all the relevant international visitors to Scotland through all major ports of entry, specifically including Aberdeen airport."
When other members and I assented to that form of words, it was the clear view of all of us that the statement was a conclusion of the committee and that we were recommending that it be taken forward. I do not want to get into a discussion of semantics, but we passed a clear proposition to ministers, who did not respond to it in the first instance. In the second instance, they have rebutted the proposal. When a committee reaches a view and passes that on to ministers, it is entitled to expect that the points, recommendations and proposals that it makes will be responded to explicitly. It is important that we record that and make clear to Mr Mather how the committee's recommendations should be interpreted.
In paragraph 274 we did not use the phrase "We recommend". This is a silly argument. Lewis Macdonald is unhappy that the minister rebutted the point, but it is not true to say that he did not respond to it—eventually, although not initially.
We will allow the clerks to draft a letter, based on what has been said. After members have viewed and agreed the letter, it will be sent to the minister. Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.