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According to the Office of National Statistics, visits to the UK by overseas residents were a record 16.4 million between January and June this year, some 8% up on the same period last year. This is excellent news.
So how did this happen? I suspect our friends at VisitBritain, the national tourist board, will claim at least some of the credit. After all, their existence is predicated on measurable results so any increase in visitor spend helps to justify the public funding they receive.
My own view is that a combination of many positive factors has contributed to this success story: Global coverage of the 2012 games, the Royal Wedding, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, fair weather, stable economic conditions, calamities elsewhere (such as the Costa Concordia disaster, which put some people off taking a cruise), the ever-improving standards of food and accommodation Britain has to offer, our ever-improving hospitality skills, curiosity triggered by the Downton Abbey series (older readers will remember how the TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited in the 1980s encouraged thousands of Americans to sample the life of an English aristocrat by staying at a luxury country house hotel) and countless other factors… and yes, better marketing too.
Just imagine what could happen if the BHA’s campaign, to see VAT on hotel accommodation and tourist attractions reduced to a level similar to that applied throughout most of Europe, were to succeed. Then we’d even be able to add competitive prices to the list above.