Hotel owners urged to unite for stronger voice

Published on Saturday 3 April 2010 14:49

TOURISM businesses should band together and speak with one voice in the same manner as the National Farmers' Union (NFU), according to the owner of one of Scotland's landmark hotels.

Stephen Leckie, managing director of Crieff Hydro, has called for hotel operators to back the Scottish Tourism Forum as the umbrella body for the sector.

He said individual operators were taking up too much of politicians' time with individual issues.

There are about 20,000 tourism businesses in Scotland, generating 4.2 billion for the economy each year and employing more than 215,000 people, or about 8 per cent of the total workforce.

Leckie told Scotland on Sunday: "This is an exciting moment because we have both enterprise minister Jim Mather and finance secretary John Swinney talking about how tourism is a big part of the growing economy and is ripe for development. That's the first time we've really seen tourism move to the heart of government and politics."

But he added: "What we have to do with tourism is try to get one voice, like the National Farmers' Union has.

"Too many small hotel, guest house and B&B owners try and shout about their own causes. I can understand why they do it but they sit and criticise VisitScotland for not bringing them business.

"But actually VisitScotland is there to bring tourists to Scotland and then it's up to the businesses to sort themselves out."