£4m cut won't stop us selling Scotland to world says VisitScotland chief

ITS campaigns have lured tourists to Scotland's shores from as far afield as the United States, Japan, Russia and China, with the promise of pristine wilderness, a warm welcome and a wee dram.

Now VisitScotland has insisted it will not have to cut back on its worldwide marketing initiatives - despite having to shave 4 million from its budget.

Scotland's tourism agency has avoided the kind of cuts imposed by VisitBritain by embarking on a cost-cutting drive, including a voluntary redundancy programme.

Up to 35 posts are due to go within the agency over the next few months, with a focus on reducing "layers of middle and senior management." Although VisitScotland employs more than 700 staff, 400 of these work in traditional tourist information centres.

But speaking on the eve of the annual Scottish Tourism Week initiative, VisitScotland's chief executive Malcolm Roughead said he had avoided swingeing cuts in the marketing budget by making other savings cutting travel expenses, sharing back- office services with other organisations, cutting back on procurement and IT savings.

VisitScotland said it had protected marketing budgets because their return on investment in recent years had been 20 for every pound spent.

It said the latest figures proved the industry had "flatlined" last year in the face of the recession and the impact of public spending cuts.

More effort is to go into promoting Scotland as a short-break destination, after growing evidence that families were shunning longer holidays to try to tighten their belts.

But it is also keeping major European and US campaigns running, including taking part in the annual Scotland Week drive, capitalising on the two royal weddings this year, and launching new international campaigns to tie in with films such as The Illusionist and The Eagle. Mr Roughead - who had his Scottish Government grant cut by 6 per cent for the next financial year - said he would have no option but to cut back marketing initiatives if his grant was cut for a second successive year.

He revealed that a new 1m fund is to be launched to help tourism businesses and organisations to band together marketing initiatives off the ground.Projects will be funded for three years to help provide more stability to business owners and tourism organisations.

It emerged this month that VisitBritain - which was hit by a 34 per cent cut in its grant - was reducing its presence from 35 overseas markets to 21, with 70 jobs to be cut.

VisitScotland was already having to make more than 3.5m in savings after tourism bodies in Glasgow and the Scottish Borders decided to pull the plug on 400,000 worth of funding.

New figures have revealed that Scotland outperformed the rest of the country last year, with the number of trips booked to Scotland down 2.62 per cent for the first ten months of 2010, compared with a drop of 3.88 per cent across the UK.

Bookings in hotels across Scotland remained at the same level in 2010 compared with the previous year, while camping and caravanning bookings rose 1 per cent. However, according to the Scottish accommodation occupancy survey, guest house and B&B bookings dropped 2 per cent last year.

Senior figures at VisitScotland had pleaded with the Scottish Government not to cut its funding, citing new figures that the industry was worth about 11.1 billion, almost three times previous estimates.

Mr Roughead said: "We are going through a voluntary redundancy programme, which will mainly affect middle and senior managers.

"However, we were very keen not to cut back on our marketing programmes, which we know are making a huge difference."

In numbers

4m has been cut from VisitScotland's budget.

700 people are employed by VisitScotland, 400 in tourist information centres.

35 posts are set go at the agency over the next few months.

3.5m cuts were already being made after reductions in income from other agencies.

34 per cent cut in grant to VisitBritain means it has to reduce its presence from 35 overseas markets to 21.