The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Bannockburn questions
THE HEAD of Scotland’s national tourism agency could be summoned to Holyrood to explain why MSPs were not told about plans to cut back the Bannockburn Live 2014 anniversary programme.
Murdo Fraser, convener of the economy, energy and tourism committee, said MSPs want to know why they were not told of plans to scale back the event or that ticket sales had been so poor when VisitScotland officials appeared before the committee on January 15.
Just two weeks later it was announced that Bannockburn 2014 was being reduced from a threeday event to just two days and that fewer than 1,000 individual tickets had been sold.
However, VisitScotland say this decision was not taken until after the committee meeting.
Although organisers had expected 45,000 people to attend over the three days of the event, fewer than 2,000 tickets were sold overall.
The event also has to compete with two other major events taking place in Stirling over the same weekend — PipeFest and the free Armed Forces Day event.
Control of Bannockburn 2014 was passed from the National Trust of Scotland to VisitScotland last week and the tourism body immediately revealed the event was being significantly restructured.
Now Mr Fraser, pictured below, has written to Mike Cantlay, chairman ofVisitScotland, toaskwhychiefexecutiveMalcolm Roughead had not mentioned the event’s problems when he spoke to MSPs.
And unless he receives a satisfactory response, Mr Fraser said Mr Cantlay may be called up before the committee to explain what happened in person. “That will be a decision for the committee as a whole but they do have that power and I think it is fair to say that committee members feel very strongly about this,” Mr Fraser said.
“There is a whole lot of public money going into this event. The whole of Homecoming 2014 needs to be a success for the Scottish tourism industry and it is important that this significant event, which is part of that, does turn out to be a success.”
A spokeswoman for VisitScotland said: “We can confirm we have received a letter from the economy, energy and tourism committee and we will be responding directly.
“No decisions about the format of the event were taken until after the committee appearance and we will outline this in our letter back to committee members.”