The new boss of the European Travel Commission warns APD is having a detrimental impact on visitor numbers to the UK. By Lucy Huxley
APD has “undoubtedly pushed North American travellers away from Britain and into continental Europe”, according to the new director of the European Travel Commission.
Speaking exclusively to Travel Weekly on a visit from Brussels to London, Eduardo Santander said: “Frankfurt is the big winner. Why would you pay more for the same thing? In fact, Frankfurt isn’t even the same as Heathrow, it’s better.
“They have more runways; they can connect to more places; and you can land at three or four in the morning because the airport isn’t in a city.
“If people fly into London they still have to cross the Channel to go anywhere else, which is perceived as more cost.
“There’s also the issue of the UK having its own currency and driving on the other side of the road. It’s all expense and hassle.
“The government thinks it can just slam on another tax, but there is big competition out there now that is definitely taking business away, so it can’t.”
The Brussels-based European Travel Commission represents 33 national tourist organisations – of which the UK is not one.
Santander has been granted €1 million by the European Commission to devise a strategy to promote Europe as a destination because, he said, it is “losing 2% market share a year”.
“There is some concern in Brussels,” he said. “They understand that tourism creates a lot of jobs – 10 million directly and 28 million indirectly in Europe.
“They also realise that tourism has the potential to fix the economy. We can’t produce more clothes or cars and, while tourism isn’t doing well, there is potential.
“It’s the only way to capitalise on our cultural heritage and natural resources. We have to sell it as a tourist package.
“So for the first time, the EC is taking care of tourism – and not just on paper but putting money into it.”
Santander said the commission would release further funds if he could show positive results.
He claimed Europe’s tourism appeal was not the problem, but that issues such as tax, visas and airport capacity desperately needed addressing by governments.
And he said he was “very confident” he could convince Brussels to act.
“They are being forced to do something because they can see tourism in Europe is in decline and they know it’s now or never.”
Santander also pointed out that tourism still did not sit in the right government departments to get real support.
“If you want to fire up your economy you’d look to your enterprise department, but in many countries, tourism doesn’t sit in ‘enterprise’. In the UK, it’s in culture, so that’s a problem for a start,” he said.
Santander’s primary marketing of Europe will be in China, the US, Canada and Brazil. Phase two will target India and Russia.
He is creating a new smartphone app, called Trip Inspirer, which will be a meta-search of offers supplied by companies through XML feeds into Amadeus.
“The plan is to consolidate offers from Europe all in one place. It will be a free bookable portal for Europe backed by European money,” Santander said.
“We are in talks with a couple of very big European travel companies to fulfil the bookings. We hope to have it up and running in six months.”