Tourism really is everyone’s business
IT’S difficult to look back on 2020 with much fondness; it’s a year we’ll all be glad to see the back of as we move into 2021 and what we hope will be a robustly efficient vaccination system coming in to force to reduce Covid-19 to a level that will allow our people, businesses and communities to thrive again.
None of us saw this coming; a year ago if you had told us ‘Fast forward 12 months… this is what life in December 2020 is like’ and painted that picture, we wouldn’t have believed you and we couldn’t have imagined it.
Isn’t it amazing how the human condition has the capacity to adapt to our external environment so quickly? Not only that, isn’t it incredible how resilient we have been, waking up every day to a situation which we can’t control, other than doing our bit to adhere to public health guidance; one that offers us very little happiness or pleasure, limited opportunity and capacity for doing business, one which in fact has stripped us of the lives we have all at times undoubtedly taken for granted and the fun, freedom and liberties we all enjoyed. One which has removed many of our most fundamental needs as humans. Yet we find ways to cope, to keep moving forward, to find solutions and try to make the best of what we can with what is very often limited financial and emotional resources.
I’ve spoken to hundreds of business owners over the past nine months and my team and I have been moved to tears at various points when we heard the detail that politicians are not always privy to; the reality of people’s lives and livelihoods which are at best, frustrating and worrying and at worst, nothing short of desperate and utterly depressing.
It is these conversations that give the STA the drive and determination to find solutions, constructively. We do so through communication, collaboration and connection. It is all too easy to attack rather than persuade; we will always use our strength to influence at the highest level and we work consistently hard, behind the scenes to do so.
We are more than a core team of five. We are a board of twelve, a council of twenty five, three forums totalling 50 with an industry behind us, connected to us in a meaningful way which enables us to communicate detail right up to Cabinet and First Minister level efficiently and also with the Secretary of State, senior ministers and MPS. We have also gained the trust and respect of the Scottish and UK governments which enables these conversations to happen, often on a daily basis.
If 2020 taught us nothing else, it has taught my team and I the value of connection, to each other and the industry we represent and collaboration with all of our stakeholders. There is no ‘them and us’, no winners and losers; anyone succeeding in one area will be challenged in another – it’s the way of life so it’s important to remember that we are all in this together and the only way out of this is to move forward, together and work as constructively and collaboratively as we can. Businesses, people and communities simply cannot be left behind – an understanding of the needs of our sector must not lessen and remain a priority for our governments if Scotland’s tourism product has a hope of every being what our Outlook 2030 strategy had the vision of being, that Scotland would be the world leaders in tourism.
As the STA continues to grow its membership from across all sectors, we will continue to use our stature, strength and power of influence to work with all governments, policy makers, civil servants and stakeholders across all of our tourism industry to bring about the best possible conditions for our the sector to survive and move towards a better future. We have always said that tourism is everyone’s business – that has never meant more than it does now.