Tourism chiefs raised fears over ‘anti-English sentiment’ with SNP government
Friction after changes to £3m marketing campaign
TOURISM chiefs raised fears over ‘anti-English sentiment’ after the SNP Government tried to airbrush references to the ‘North of England’ out of a VisitScotland campaign.
Emails between the quango and the Scottish Government have revealed officials suggested altering a press release – removing any mention of England and Northern Ireland – before it was issued.
On July 15, the day Scotland’s tourism industry reopened following lockdown, VisitScotland launched a £3million marketing initiative.
As part of this, a release entitled ‘welcoming back Scottish tourism’ was issued.
In the initial draft, sent to the Scottish Government on July 13 for approval, the tourism body said the campaign would be ‘extended to target the North of England from July 24’.
However, an official responded stating they have ‘made a suggested change in the news release’. They had scored out an entire paragraph from the release, airbrushing any mention of England from the document.
The piece initially stated: ‘The campaign will be extended to target the North of England from July 24 including a partnership with TripAdvisor and Expedia, followed by the rest of the UK and additional advertising with media titles including Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping and Red Magazine and an advertising campaign in Northern Ireland starting on July 31.’
In the email, the Scottish Government official did not suggest that this should be reworded but scored through it in red.
VisitScotland replied: ‘It would be useful to know why you’ve taken out the information regarding the North of England activity?’
It added: ‘We’re getting a lot of pressure from the industry to know when we’re targeting visitors from outside of Scotland, especially given the recent negative “antiEnglish” sentiment in the media where they’re seeing lots of cancellations as a result.
‘We’re very keen to keep that information in there to assure peoCosmopolitan, ple that’s the next stage of the campaign.’
Another of the documents says that the email was followed by a telephone conversation ‘to discuss the point further’.
According to the document it resulted in ‘the text being streamlined to refer simply to the rest of the UK’.
The final press release issued on July 15 stated: ‘The campaign will be extended to the rest of the UK from the end of July including a partnership with TripAdvisor and Expedia, and additional advertising with media titles including Good Housekeeping and Red Magazine.’
VisitScotland has confirmed the campaign has not yet been extended, and still targets only Scotland ‘under Scottish Government guidance’.
Scottish Tory tourism spokesman Oliver Mundell said the correspondence ‘confirms that the anti-English sentiment doesn’t lurk far below the surface with this SNP Government’.
He added: ‘The North of England is a vital market for the tourism industry and one we should wholeheartedly be encouraging.
‘Our tourism industry is on life support and it needs a government that will roll out the red carpet, not pull the rug from under it.’
There is concern in the tourism sector in Scotland over a drop in bookings and cancellations from visitors from England.
This followed Nicola Sturgeon’s refusal to rule out bringing in quarantine measures for visitors from England over her claims the prevalence of Covid-19 was five times lower north of the Border.
The First Minister was rebuked by the UK Statistics Authority over this comparison.
There were also incidents of protesters on the Border waving Saltires and SNP signs telling those crossing into Scotland to turn around.
Willie Macleod, of trade association UKHospitality, said that there is a ‘continuing lack of demand for hospitality and tourism’.
He added: ‘It is a matter of considerable regret if VisitScotland marketing activities in other parts of the UK are stifled without very good reason, especially as RoUK is a vital market for Scotland’s tourism industry.’
Mr Mundell said: ‘We have seen some shameful scenes at the Border telling English people to stay out of Scotland.
‘That sort of messaging is completely unacceptable and must be called out by senior members of the SNP Government.’
A Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘The priority is to continue to suppress the virus and mitigate any further instances of clusters. For that reason the preference is to continue the marketing focus on staycations in Scotland, with a mind to targeting the full UK market when levels of the virus in other parts of the UK are sufficiently low.’
‘Tourism industry on life support’