Caribbean Tourism Ministers Pick Up Lobbying Pace Against UK Airport Taxes
September 3, 2010
CaribWorldNews, BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Fri. Sept. 3, 2010: Caribbean ministers of tourism kicking off next week set intensify their lobbying effort against the UK`s Air Passenger Duty early next week in London.
Between September 6th and 8th, six Caribbean ministers of tourism, along with the Caribbean Tourism Organization Secretary General, Hugh Riley, will be in London for talks on the Air Passenger Duty with a range of organisations, including the Association of British Travel Agents, the Caribbean Council, Caribbean Diaspora representatives, the British Air Transport Association and the British Caribbean All Party Parliamentary Group.
The Caribbean delegation will be lobbying for a fairer alternative to the current APD system, which currently taxes flights from Britain to the Caribbean more heavily than travel to Hawaii, and is set to rise for the second time in a year within the next two months.
In November 2008 APD was re-worked into a four-tier band system, categorising destinations according to the distance between London and their national capital. From 1 November, APD on flights to the Caribbean will have risen by up to 94 per cent over two years, meaning that a four-person family travelling to the Caribbean in premium economy will pay £600 in APD alone.
The ministers will be lobbying for their region, officially the most tourism-dependent in the world (14.5 per cent of the region`s GDP and, for some islands, over 70 per cent) to potentially be moved into the same band as the USA and Bermuda, or for the APD system to be replaced with a fairer structure.
`We feel that the size of the delegation which is coming to the UK on 6 September underscores the importance that the Caribbean attaches to this issue and the seriousness of our intent to minimise the possible damage that this second set of price increases will bring about,` said the CTO`s Riley in a statement Thursday. `The rises come at time when a second British recession is being forecast and the Caribbean governments and people feel that it is paramount that we discuss the issue with every responsible body in order to find a mutually acceptable solution as soon as possible.`
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