Himalayan News Service

London, July 17:

Britain’s tourism industry has quickly recovered from the London bomb attacks, with visitors deciding against cancelling holidays to flock to the capital’s attractions, travel organisations insist. The medium-to-long term impact for the sector is not so clear, however, following the July 7 suicide attacks on London’s transport network that killed at least 55 people and injured hundreds more. “There may be some downturn over the next few weeks but we expect any impact to be very limited and for a short duration,” said Stephen Dowd, chief executive of UKinbound, the trade association representing Britain’s inbound tourism industry. In a bid to assess any future impact, UKinbound and other tourism bodies have commissioned a series of studies, with the first report set to be published in about six weeks. “It’s far too early to make any predictions” about the long-term consequences on Britain’s tourism industry after bombs ripped through the capital’s transport network, said Zoe Shurgold, a spokeswoman for Visit London — the capital’s official tourism organisation, “Any predictions that have been made so far can’t be taken into account too much.”

Research groups and economists have rushed to give their verdicts on the financial cost of the bombings that exploded on three London underground railway trains and a double-decker bus. According to the the World Travel and Tourism Council, the number of overseas visitors travelling to Britain in 2005 could total almost 600,000 fewer than the 31 million tourists initially forecast to arrive. However its president, Jean-Claude Baumgarten, added that the fall-out will disappear by 2007, as long the government helps to rebuild visitor confidence and no further attacks occur. Regarding the wider British economy, one economist forecast the atrocities could cost Britain up to $5.28 billion during the current third quarter. Jan Rudolph, head of the risk department at the London-based World Markets Research Centre, predicted also a quarterly fall in British gross domestic product growth of up to 0.2 per cent. Tourism groups are particularly pleased that US travellers, who along with Japanese visitors, tend to spend the most during holidays in Britain, have not been put off by the blasts. “The North American market has been very robust,” Dowd said, “Americans are continuing with their travel plans, they are not changing them as they would have done a few years ago” following the September 11 terror attacks in New York and Washington.

“Other markets have not been quite so good and this is not to do with the individuals but with the way it’s been reported by the press. There has been some sensationalist press coverage in Japan, Greece, Sweden and a few other countries,” he added. Such media coverage has particularly angered Visit London, which put out a statement a week after the attacks, insisting

the capital is ‘very much business as usual’. It added, “Visit London wants to correct any impression that some of London’s visitor attractions are closed and disruption from the bomb attacks is restricting freedom of movement.” As far as London’s theatres are concerned, actors are again performing to near full houses in the West End district after shows were cancelled on the day of the explosions. London’s open-top bus tours are also back on course after a few slow trading days. “We have had a few cancellations, we have noticed a slight downturn, but not as much as we thought,” said Mark Osborne, commercial manager at The Big Bus Company, “We are implementing extra security checks just to make sure, such as random bag checking as people get on the buses.”