8. Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on support for businesses in the tourism industry? OAQ(5)0165(EI)

Yes. Our tourism strategy, ‘Partnership for Growth’, sets out our priorities for each of the years leading to the turn of this decade to grow the tourism industry across Wales; to invest in the industry; and to ensure that, as a partnership, we go on enjoying world-class developments and events that are attracting many, many millions of people every year.

Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. Of course, the tourism industry in Wales brings in over £6.2 billion to our economy, 13 per cent compared to just 8 per cent in England, 10 per cent in Scotland and only 4 per cent in Northern Ireland, a direct contribution of £2.7 billion that equates to 6 per cent of our GDP. That’s predicted to grow to 7 per cent by 2020 and that accounts, of course, for 14 per cent in terms of employment. It is clear that as a Government you should be valuing, encouraging and supporting this much-valued industry. But much of it, of course, is achieved, by those working in the private sector with much personal investment and a lot of hard work. Given the huge burden now facing many small tourism operators—and I do know of hoteliers in Llandudno who are facing now recent increases of over 83 per cent—how are you working as a Government to look once again at the business rates multiplier in order to prevent our businesses, in effect, from going backwards and perhaps going out of business?

I think the Member raises a number of important points. First and foremost, the Government is here to help businesses that right now are struggling because of revaluation. The Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government has detailed the support and the increase in resources available to support small businesses, not just in the tourism sector, but in many other sectors. But I think it’s also important that we recognise the importance of growing the value of the visitor economy. It’s through growing the value that we grow profit levels, largely, and in North Wales, an area of the country that the Member represents, we’ve seen a pretty staggering growth in the number of high-quality restaurants, hotels and tourist attractions.

I was with Sean Taylor, the entrepreneur that put together the Zip World collection of world-class attractions, just last week to see the new forest coaster: a remarkable piece of infrastructure—a first-on-the-planet piece of infrastructure—and something that many would consider to be very eccentric, but it is of the highest quality. As the Member highlighted in her question, it’s being delivered by an entrepreneur with somewhat eccentric ideas, but ideas that are delivering the goods. Where people come forward with ideas that are workable, we will back them. As has been shown by Zip World, right across an area of North Wales that desperately needed investment in jobs and services, he’s created more than 200 jobs in that time. That’s an incredible achievement. So, I want to see the sector go on growing, not just in number—in terms of employment numbers—but also in terms of quality.

I’ll be making an announcement tomorrow regarding the recent thematic years, which I hope Members will discover is exciting. But I’m also intent on making sure that we use our resources through the tourism innovation fund and the tourism investment support scheme to continue to develop world-class reputation-changing attractions that bring more people into Wales, spending more money, driving up the value of the economy and making sure that those visitor-economy-related businesses are sustainable in the long term.

And finally, question 9, Eluned Morgan.