Negative spin on positive tourism initiative

I ALWAYS welcome discussion about tourism in the business pages of Scotland on Sunday, particularly when it is focused on growing Scotland's most important industry. Tourism is critical for the future of Scotland and investment is important if we want to build on the growth we saw in 2009.

However, the headline and the first paragraph were pretty far from the mark in terms of the interview with your reporter (Business News, 2 May). I never "demanded" state cash or "attacked" government funding priorities as was portrayed in the story. Anyone who works with government knows that tourism is a major priority and I talked about how we have been working very closely with government and Scottish Enterprise to identify funding for tourism businesses from existing sources.

Although the rest of the interview was an accurate reflection of the interview it is disappointing that such a positive initiative was introduced in such a negative way.

Philip Riddle, CEO, VisitScotland