The Association of Women Travel Executives (AWTE) has withdrawn its support from this year’s ITT Conference saying the institute’s values were “no longer in line” with its own.
The AWTE has supported the event for 10 years, regularly hosting the welcome drinks on the first night of the conference.
The AWTE board voted unanimously to withdraw its support from this year’s event which takes place in Croatia in June.
Out of 27 of those listed as speakers at this year’s conference in June, 10 are female.
Sarah Clayton Turner, AWTE chair, said: “The AWTE feel we have no choice but to distance ourselves from an organisation that isn’t aligned with what we are trying to achieve or indeed the diversity balance.
“The AWTE engages openly with male colleagues and embraces male members. The stance the ITT is taking is not in line with our values. We hope that by making a stance against the direction the ITT appears to be taking, the industry also listens.
“We have been working collaboratively with other organisations with regards to their gender and diversity imbalance, which have embraced the constructive feedback we have provided and as a result we are now working to support them further.”
Some AWTE board members will still be attending the event in their work capacity.
ITT chairman Steven Freudmann said he was “disappointed” by the decision and and said the ITT was “absolutely committed” to diversity.
“We’re clearly disappointed by their withdrawal. We have had an excellent relaitonship with the AWTE for a number of years,” he said.
“We have a huge commitment to diversity – last year the keynote speaker was Dawn Butler, the shadow women and equalities secretary. This year we have Jo Delahunty who is a huge campaigner for women’s rights.
“We choose speakers on their merit who can reflect the state of the industry, we don’t choose based on gender.”
Freudmann said ITT was in discussions with a number of organisations about hosting the drinks reception.
This week ITT announced a new board of directors which saw two females and one male step down. They were replaced by one female and two males.
Julia Lo Bue-Said, chief executive of Advantage, Jo Kolatsis, founding director of Themis Advisory and Simon Johnson, founding director of Shipshape Consulting have stepped down.
MSC Cruises UK managing director Antonio Paradiso, Holiday Extras head of partnerships James Lewis and A-Rosa River Cruises managing director UK and Ireland Lucia Rowe have taken up new positions on the board.