The Government’s decision to revisitAnguilla’s policy relating to cruise ships, as articulated elsewhere in this edition of The Anguillian by the Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism, Mr. Haydn Hughes, may be a matter for much discussion.
This is in light of the long-established policy of promoting tourism at the upper-end of the market, and fears generally expressed by upscale property owners, and developers, as well as the views of the Hotel and Tourism Association, regarding mass tourism. Actually, from a point of publicity, increased numbers of visitors, and local business opportunities, it can be argued, with much weight, that nothing is really wrong with certain sizes of cruise ships coming toAnguilla. Two good examples are the luxurious Silver Cloud which brought in 296 passengers, and the French cruise ship, Club Med 2, which came in with 308 visitors several days ago.
It is perhaps only when severely-crowded ships with visitors from the lower end of the market start arriving on the island that some form of policy control regulations may be applied. Without referring to this type of scenario, the Parliamentary Secretary has indicated that consideration will be given to small luxury ships coming to the island. He revealed that the Government was already considering increasing the number of cruise ship visits from one per month, to one a week, and that contact was being made with cruise line companies to tell them thatAnguillais open for business.
The Parliamentary Secretary, without qualifying his statement, said that there were a number of “glitches” which needed to be ironed out in terms of cruise ship visits to the island. From The Anguillian’s perspective, there must be a right balance between upmarket tourism, where visitors spend large sums of money at our classy hotel resorts, and where hordes of cruise ship passengers may simply crowd the island without spending a dime at our various gift shops and boutiques, or visiting other places of national historic and cultural interest. Much attention must continue to be placed on what is called, in tourism language, “low volume, high yield” as has been the case with tourism policies inAnguillaover the years.
Some of the other glitches to which the Parliamentary Secretary may have silently referred, probably included the lack of a deep water harbour and suitable berthing facilities, but these costly things are still way down the road. What the simpler and smaller glitches may also be, include paying particular attention to tidying up the port of arrival and beaches; alerting tour guides, arts and crafts persons, guardians and preservers of our history and culture, entertainers and other people engaged in such national services, and involving them in an organisedprogramme for the cruise ship visitors travelling or just wondering across the island.
It is understood that one of the general plans to improve the transportation of visitors is to have our taxi-drivers wear uniforms shortly. We are afraid that neither this nor their gleaming vehicles will have much worth unless the taxi-drivers are made to undergo some form of tourism-related educationor tour-training to properly deal with, and inform visitors.
Among the first things visitors should want to know,is information about the place and people they are visiting. How many of our taxi-drivers take tourists to our places of history, arts and crafts and other historic and cultural sites that tell so much about our island and its inhabitants? Surely, to take them merely to beaches is not enough. If we are to promote cruise ship visits and, for that matter general tourism inAnguilla, there is an urgent need to iron out whatever glitches there may be that impede the selling of the island to our visitors.
