Josephides wrong choice for ABTA chair, says industry heavyweight

Lowcost Travel Group founder Paul Evans has taken a public swipe at one of the two candidates vying to become the next ABTA chairman, saying "if everyone votes for Noel Josephides, will the last one to leave ABTA turn out the lights".

Speaking at Barclays annual Travel Forum in front of a packed audience of 300 industry heavyweights, Evans said he had "enormous respect" for Sunvil managing director Noel Josephides, but he was hoping All Leisure Group executive chairman Roger Allard would beat him in the race to be the next ABTA chairman.

"I think ABTA has lost its way badly," said Evans. "It doesn’t have any bed banks, they’ve all resigned, ABTA needs to represent the wider market.

"Noel does a superb job representing the views of AITO (Association of Independent Tour Operators), members who carry 20,000 passengers, but Roger Allard will do a superb job representing big businesses."

Allard, who shared the stage with Evans during a Travel Forum debate, said he was "pretty confident" he would succeed John McEwan as the next ABTA chairman. Members will be asked to vote later this month.

ABTA president Mark Tanzer described both Allard and Josephides as "very strong candidates" and said he was pleased with the amount of publicity the election was generating.

However, some of those attending the Travel Forum queried whether ABTA was still relevant. John Bevan, managing director of SpaFinder Europe said: "I don’t think it carries the weight it once did."

Former ABTA president and ITT chairman Steven Freudmann said: "In the old days 3,000 went to the ABTA conference, now I understand less than 900 members attend."

Andy Cooper, Thomas Cook director of government and external affairs said ABTA should give up trying to be a regulator.  "I think ABTA has to accept it is a trade association," he said.

Not surprisingly, Tanzer disagreed, saying: "ABTA is as relevant as ever, we protect principles in the event of an ABTA member failure, that’s important, so I disagree with Andy, all roles are complementary."  

Kate Jennings, the government’s head of aviation implementation policy said ABTA had been very helpful in shaping Flight Plus, while Civil Aviation Authority head of ATOL Andy Cohen said: "When we over-complicate things, ABTA are there to simplify them."

Steve Endacott, founder of the Association of Travel Agents, told the conference it was not looking to compete with ABTA. "We believe ABTA is a very strong body and we are not looking to give it up to the tour operators, but we think it is tour operator dominated and we strongly disagree with its policy on the European Package Travel Directive."