The mayor of London’s brother Leo Johnson surprised ABTA delegates in Malta this week with a session on sustainability that actually championed travelling for pleasure.
The climate change expert and partner at PriceWaterhouseCoopers told a packed audience that cash-strapped Britons were refusing to sacrifice their holidays in the same way that they had stopped spending elsewhere.
He said that during this recession people had stopped spending on consumer items as they realized they could be happy without them, but that this did not extend to travel.
“In this recession something has happened. Purchasing things like food in restaurants or handbags has gone right down but something that has remained stable is travel. It is not a discretionary spend and people do not want to do without it.”
In a session where delegates were asked to think for 30 seconds about the last time they were really happy, Johnson concluded that travel is intrinsic to people’s sense of wellbeing and often linked to their memories of happiness.
He concluded: “People buying travel is actually a substitute for high carbon activities like buying things they don’t need. Now people are shopping and spending money on the things that make them happy such as travel. And they won’t substitute that.”
By Dinah Hatch
