Head teachers should pool their staff training days to create an extra week’s holiday in May or June as an alternative to term-time fines, a UK tourism boss has said.
Malcolm Bell, CEO of Visit Cornwall, said the move ‘would make a big difference to families and help the tourism industry reduce congestion at peak times’.
He is among several tourism bosses in the UK calling on the Government to scrap fines for term-time holidays, saying the policy is hitting the industry hard.
Bell told the Plymouth Herald penalties were a ‘naïve, silly knee-jerk reaction that did not have the intended effect’.
He added: "They created a problem for the tourism industry."
Alistair Handyside, chairman of the South West Tourism Alliance, agreed, telling the newspaper: "It is absolute hogwash which is damaging the tourism industry in Devon and Cornwall."
He added: "It does not affect well-off families who, if they are spending thousands of pounds on a holiday take a £200 fine as part of the cost.
"It stops poorer families from having a holiday."
Bell added: "It’s not true there is a cartel pushing up school holiday time prices. It’s supply and demand."
