Tourism bosses lacked funds to back 2014 Tour de France bid

Speaking to the Yorkshire Post, Visit England boss James Berresford said his agency is unable to take the “aggressive approach” of other national tourism bodies such as Visit Scotland in backing sporting bids, because it simply does not have the money.

Securing the Grand Depart is estimated to be worth more than £100m to the local economy.

A rival Scottish bid was backed by Visit England’s sister organisations Visit Britain and Visit Scotland – with the latter providing significant financial support to the Scottish bid team.

Yorkshire MPs have since accused British tourism bosses of “backing the wrong horse”.

Asked why Visit England did not offer similar funding to Yorkshire’s bid, Mr Berresford said his agency could not compete financially with the money made available to Visit Scotland by the devolved Scottish government.

“We’re differently funded to Visit Scotland,” he said. “Visit Scotland have far more funds at their disposal. And being a devolved authority, they can have that more aggressive approach, because they’ve got more funds to do it. We don’t.”

Mr Berresford said he is nonetheless optimistic the region’s success in securing the Grand Depart in 2014, and the likelihood it will also host some of the 2015 Rugby World Cup fixtures, mean the “momentum” of last year’s Olympic success can be maintained.

“If we keep our nerve, keep supporting tourism and keep securing things like the Rugby World Cup and the Grand Depart, we have the opportunity with those major events to keep the momentum going,” he said.

“But we must not be complacent – we are in a competitive world.”

Tourism bosses had long flagged up 2012 as a pivotal year for Britain to showcase itself to the world, owing to the London Olympics. But Mr Berresford admitted the appalling weather hampered efforts to sell England as a tourist destination.

The Met Office announced last week that 2012 was the wettest year ever recorded in England.

“This (past) year has been quite a difficult year,” Mr Berresford said. “The weather has not helped us – the floods, the weather, the perception of the weather has not helped us.

“We’ve shown this country to the world through the Olympics – now we need to show it again through the Rugby League World Cup this year, the Grand Depart, and the Rugby World Cup.”

While visitor numbers may have been unimpressive in 2012, Mr Berresford insists the nation will still reap the benefits of the Olympics this summer and over the years to come.

“It’s always been about the legacy,” he said. “I think working with Visit Britain, we can look forward to a greater appetite internationally (for visiting the UK) over the next two or three years.

“We’ve also done research that shows Brits felt proud about their country as a result of the Olympics, and 20 per cent of those people felt more inclined to have a break in this country because of that feel-good factor.

“So I hope we get a spike (in visitors numbers), and we’ll certainly work to get a spike.”

He insisted the benefit would be felt beyond London, and recounts how his agency took groups of international journalists on tours to Yorkshire and other parts of the country while they were here.

“We worked very hard – we took Press trips up to Yorkshire, we’ve done all we can,” he said. “Images of this country have been beamed around the world. I don’t think it is just London (that will benefit), I really don’t.”