Premier Dr. Ewart Brown says he has overseen a recovery in visitor numbers to the Island during his tenure as Minister of Tourism and Transport.

Bermuda offers the international traveller safety in a post-9/11 world with the freedom of a "private island", according to Dr. Brown, also the Tourism Minister who describes the Island's unique selling point as "the friendliness and warmth of our people".

Ritz-Carlton, St. Regis and Jumeirah are among the five-star brands currently eyeing the Island for new resorts, and Dr. Brown points to a "Platinum Period" of luxurious hotels offering Bermudians opportunities to advance in the hospitality industry. To meet these five-star standards, he plans to create a Hospitality Learning Centre.

Dr. Brown said he has also engaged the services of a development consultant to mitigate any adverse impact of the new resorts on the Island's infrastructure.

The Premier gave an interview to The Royal Gazette on his role in tourism over the past four years and his vision for the future. This is what Dr. Brown had to say:

Why does Bermuda need tourism so much?

"A one-legged economy, even if it were based on natural resources, can be risky. Our economy is extremely dependent on international business and this could be significantly altered by legislative changes, especially in America.

"A change in the tax laws in the United States could affect the well-being and success of US companies in Bermuda and most of our companies here are US companies, and so it's important we diversify the economy and the most natural next pillar for us is one we're familiar with, which is tourism."

Why are so many big hotels in the pipeline, as opposed to smaller boutique hotels which are a global trend?

"The hotels are not big by international standards — I think there's only one approaching 300 rooms which is smaller than our largest hotel now. Most are in the 15-200 bed range which I think is small/medium size. It's not so much the number of properties but the quality of the properties that we've been focusing on."

Some people have expressed concern at the speed of development, particularly with the SDOs and the potential loss of green space. What is your position on that?

"The first response to that is, isn't it nice to have that problem? Our original problem was that no one was interested in developing in Bermuda, and now we have this surge of interest. By the way, the SDO was a concept put into place by the former Government. We think it's a good process and we don't think that the fact we have an opportunity to use it invalidates it as a tool."

How will Bermuda's infrastructure cope with these new resorts?

"We have engaged a development consultant whose job is to make sure that the hotel development in particular is phased, that the infrastructure does not crumble or even creak under the pressure of development. It won't be that everything will happen all at once, and most of the developments are going to happen in places where there has been development before (brownfield sites).

"The consultant is already here and working with us."

What about staffing?

"In the hospitality business the opportunities for part-time jobs are plentiful. I would predict that many Bermudians are going to seek part-time jobs in the industry, especially with the pride which comes with working at a Ritz-Carlton, a Jumeirah and a St. Regis — this lifts the whole image and panache of the business.

"I predict that many Bermudians are going to enter for the first time, while some are going to come back to the hospitality industry. The jobs that are left after that will have to be filled with people from other parts of the world.

"But it is important to note that not one of the hotel development projects will be licensed without staff housing in place. That's important, because we think that is a draw for Bermudians. With housing being so scarce, we thought that this would be an attraction to get young people into the industry."

Dr. Brown then described the Hospitality Learning Centre. The Premier said: "It's going to be the Tourism Department's feeder school if you will, for entry-level jobs in the hospitality area, and it's going to be a joint effort between Government and the private sector."

Asked about the courses already available at the Bermuda College, Dr. Brown said: "There have been different types of effort at Bermuda College but this time the project is going to be inside tourism. We didn't want to get involved in any of the larger programmes, we didn't want to put it in education, we want to make it a tourism-focused effort."

There has been concern from local businesses that Dockyard will not be ready for all these cruise ships in 2009, in terms of commercial premises and other activities.

"Chicken and egg again, what comes first? It's difficult to ask business owners, retail in particular, to move first, just like we didn't get hotel developers interested until we got the air lift problem fixed and then the people started to come. Wall Street's interest was piqued and then they came. So, what will happen at Dockyard is when they see the Second Pier coming to fruition then the private sector mentality will click on and will say 'Oh it is here, let us now move'.

"Government's role is not to put all the pieces in place. Our role is to facilitate, stimulate and create the possibility, and nurture confidence in the project, to keep the general economy strong so that people have the financial wherewithal to do these things. I have no doubt, Bermudians are as entrepreneurial as anybody and as soon as they know that things are coming, they will be there.

"Wedco has space and they deal with that by time-tested methods, and I'm sure they're going to be overrun by people who want to capitalise on the presence of 5,000 people in Dockyard."

But research has shown that cruise ship passengers don't spend as much money in the local economy as air visitors (cruise passengers accounted for 53 percent of arrivals but only contributed ten percent to the tourist expenditure, according to the 2006 Economic Impact Report).

"Yes, we know that and that's a fact. But you know, I'll say it again, a cruise ship passenger is better than no passenger, and until our hotels are up and running we want to make sure there's a strong complement of cruise passengers coming into Bermuda. We manage that, each year we manage the number, and we will manage them further as the hotel sector emerges."

What plans do you have for new air carriers and routes to the Island?

"There are two gateways where we still haven't had the introduction of low-cost carriers — Atlanta and Toronto, but we're in constant communication with potential low-cost partners out of there. The load factors on the airplanes are determined in a large part by the hotel inventory, so right now all we're doing is spreading out passengers on the existing carriers to match the inventory available in Bermuda, and we don't want to dilute those load factors any further. So we're not really making any strong effort to add new air lift, we have adequate air lift right now."

As regards Faith Based Tourism, how many tourists has this brought to the Island?

"I don't have the exact numbers but Mr. Curtis has a contract with the Department and he has certain numbers that he has to be able to reach and verify, and just as we look at every other contract, we'll see whether that is working. We had three or four years of culinary arts festivals that didn't draw 100 people a year and we persisted and then finally concluded it wasn't going to work for us. And that's what we do, and Faith Based Tourism has the potential — it did well in its first year. I suspect they will do well this year, but his relationship with the Department is based on a contract."

The Royal Gazette then asked Dr. Brown to answer Parliamentary Questions asked by Opposition Leader Michael Dunkley in June on the total funds raised to date for Government's Faith Based Tourism initiative, the various programmes funded so far, and the costs of administration — including salaries.

Are these figures correct and are you willing to answer these questions now rather than in Parliament?

"No. These are questions about Faith Based Tourism and I think that certain of these questions have been answered and surely will be answered in the House. I don't know whether they were already, but we have the information and there's nothing secret about it. The acting Director has told me that as far as she's concerned the contract is being complied with."

Can you release the figures before the election?

"I doubt it."

Why not?

"Because they're Parliamentary questions and should appropriately be answered in the House."

Regarding the furore over the Rosie O'Donnell gay cruise, were you embarrassed by Andre Curtis' comments, with him being your campaign chairman? (Mr. Curtis, also chairman of United By Faith, had said: "We may just choose to pick them (the passengers) up by bus and bus them to our church, to different denominations, and have the pastors pray for them.")

"I wasn't embarrassed. I was disappointed, but there's room for that. He expressed what I know to be his personal opinion and we don't shoot our soldiers."

Is there anything you can do to encourage the pink pound/pink dollar? Is there anything you can do to encourage gay tourism now?

"We don't go out and encourage any sector of tourism. We accept all tourists and when anyone from the gay community approaches us we deal with them straight up in the same context. And if someone came today, and said they wanted to put on an event in Bermuda we would look at it like we look at everything else, and Rosie O'Donnell knows that and that is why she was kinder than she might have been when we had the issue."

Former Shadow Minister of Tourism David Dodwell has criticised the Department of Tourism for including the business figures in with visitor arrival numbers. If tourism is doing so well, why would there be any need for spin?

"I'm sure that Mr. Dodwell knows an overall marketing and advertising programme may attract different types of visitor. Business visitors spend more per day than leisure visitors, and when they call The Reefs hotel for a business reservation Mr. Dodwell accepts that reservation. He has been so impressed he is now investing millions of dollars in an extension. That to me demonstrates his confidence in the future of tourism, and so we don't get too interested in worrying about whether our visitors are leisure or business, because they both represent heads in beds and generate the spend, and I don't feel like splitting those hairs."

Are you concerned about the reliance on business visitors?

"It's not a reliance. You cannot accept the compliment that you are a growing international business sector and then say but we don't want your people to stay in our hotels, that doesn't make sense. We accept them and we count them because they contribute to the economy in many ways, just like a pure leisure tourist. In addition, some of them bring family members and they don't get registered as leisure because the lead person is here on business."

Following the interest in China, are there any other countries in your marketing plan for Bermuda?

"China is the fastest growing economy on the planet, all of our competitors are trying to secure a piece of that China business. China is in our long-term plans and we may branch out again."

What do you feel are the main challenges in tourism globally which Bermuda will now face?

"Many travellers are concerned about their own safety and that's where Bermuda again has an edge. We want to be able to treat our visitors to a special experience which does not include high walls, barbed wire fences and armed guards. Bermuda is well positioned to stay away from that.

"Tourists also want to explore and we market Bermuda as a private island. We say you get off the plane or the ship, you get on a moped or a taxi, and the Island is yours. Not too many destinations can offer that."

What do you feel are your main achievements over the past four years?

"I'm particularly proud of the teamwork in the Departments of Tourism and Transport which has resulted in lower air fares, because that was a major obstacle. It was entirely too expensive for people to get here, and when they got here they had less to spend.

"The second thing I think is commendable for our team is that we managed to get the interest and attract the eye of Wall Street. Once they saw the flow increasing to Bermuda, then hotel development, which had essentially been on hold for 30 years, started to happen. That I think is vital in terms of introducing what I call the Platinum Period.

"The Platinum Period is going to begin around 2010 when our properties should be up out of the ground and we can look around Bermuda and say that we have three or four five-star properties, and we're attracting the kind of visitor that can make our economy even more successful."

What is your vision for the future?

"My vision is that we will go through this construction period, we'll go through our preparations for Bermudians to enter the industry, and this time around they will enter it with the possibility of moving up. One of the reasons Bermudians exited the hospitality industry was that there was no upward mobility. You could go in but never up, and Bermudians got tired of it so they came out.

"This Government considers that a priority and we have the assurances of all of the existing properties and the new ones that that will not be a barrier anymore. We don't want to be the only country on the planet where you don't find locals experiencing upward mobility."