The importance of being a visitor

In the last two years, a third of all new jobs created in our countries have been in tourism. 2.6 million of us work in tourism. Which is one reason why when Visit Britain launches its strategy document for attracting more visitors, it pays for us to listen.
But CD-Traveller is about tourism and travel and Visit Britain is only about attracting overseas visitors not about our readers you might say. But the money that VB raises is matched by private enterprise. And they are places like attractions so more tourists can mean better facilities for us. And more jobs. Between now and 2020, VB hopes to generate a further 200,000 jobs on top of the 2.6 million tourism jobs there already are and to bring in a further £8.7 billion for the treasury.
Maria Miller, the Culture Secretary, said that cities and destinations recognised the importance of tourism as local economic growth generators. Already she is being lobbied by MP’s advocating one destination over another for the 2017 British capital of culture, a title currently held by Londonderry. Nothing seems to cause growth faster than tourism.
So step forward readers, because you are more important than you imagine. For every visit you make, for every attraction you go to you are contributing to turning our countries from recession to growth. Provided you make those visits whilst in the UK or Ireland. Go abroad and you are helping another country improve. But is that such a bad thing either?