Can I thank Tom Giffard for those comments and those questions? If I start with his first comments around the engagement and visitor management programme, that's something that we're clearly continuing to engage on with the local community, with the museum of north Wales and the slate landscape management organisations, including Gwynedd Council, Snowdonia national park and so on. So, there will be ongoing engagement with those organisations that will be delivering that engagement, and I would hope to be able to come back to you at some point in the not-too-distant future with an update on how that has worked in practice and what the level of visitor engagement has been for that. 

You make a number of other points about heritage and tourism in the area, and you quite rightly point to the fact that we have two significant world heritage sites—not only the slate landscapes, but the castles of King Edward and so on. What we do know is that those sites attract somewhere in the region of 500,000 to 600,000 visitors a year. Certainly what we are hoping is that the development that we've invested in at Caernarfon castle will see those visitor numbers increase. Part of the purpose of that development is to bring more visitors to that part of Wales, but it is also not to forget the story that we want Caernarfon castle to be telling. Part of that investment is about telling that story and for people to see that story with warts and all, in all its honesty, and through all of the turbulent times of the history of that castle. But, let's not forget that over that castle today flies the Welsh flag, and, of course, that is the important end role in the history of Caernarfon castle.

In terms of the comments about the zip wire, obviously that is a huge tourist attraction again in that area. It sits within the heritage landscape, so we are working very closely with the owners of the zip wire so that they can work to develop their offer and their site whilst at the same time having a sympathetic approach to what is an attraction that sits in the middle of what is now a world heritage landscape.

You quite rightly point to the issues around sporting heritage. I'm very grateful to Sam Rowlands, who is bringing a debate tomorrow, actually, on that, and I'll be responding to that. So, maybe some of the questions that you've raised will be answered in the response to that debate. But, you're absolutely right: our sporting heritage is something to be very proud of, and the north Wales sporting heritage in particular has a lot to shout about. I will say more about that tomorrow in response to Sam's debate. My statement today was very specifically about the slate landscapes and about Caernarfon castle. 

In terms of the tourism levy, I take my hat off to Tom and to all of his Conservative colleagues who seek to raise this issue of the tourism levy at each and every opportunity that they have. It's what you do; you're the opposition, and I understand that that's what you need to do. Obviously, we want to see a thriving tourism industry, of course we do, and we want to see that strong recovery from the pandemic. It needs to be reiterated again and again—because it has been said many times—that the visitor levy will be a discretionary levy for local authorities to determine for themselves whether they feel that a very small proportion of visitor spend in their area is taken in a tourism levy that will help to develop tourism in that area.

I just recently came back from Italy. I went to Italy on holiday in the summer, and I was very fortunate to get to the world heritage vineyard landscape of Piedmont in the north of Italy. It was very difficult to drag myself away from it—it was beautiful—but I happily paid a tourism levy when I was there, as I normally do in any of the holiday locations that I go to. As colleagues will be aware, the Women’s Rugby World Cup starts next week in New Zealand and, as sports Minister, I will be going out to New Zealand to offer the support of the Government and the Welsh nation to our women playing rugby out there. I've just had to apply for a visa to enter New Zealand and, lo and behold, when applying for that visa I also had to pay an £18 tourism levy. That's just the way it is. There are more than 40 countries and holiday destinations around the world that have a visitor levy, and I think if the visitor levy was as destructive as you suggest it might be, most of those countries would have abandoned it by now.