Tourism Minister Ewart Brown has defended his decision to use the Internet search engine Expedia as the main booking agent on the Government?s tourism website.

The Deputy Premier was criticised by hoteliers and Shadow Tourism Minister David Dodwell for not consulting on the decision to use the set-up, which reportedly charges a 20 percent booking fee. Hoteliers included on the site are worried that they will have to pay a much larger slice of commission to a third party for every booking made.

Dr. Brown chose not to comment on the arrangement at the time, but said at a public PLP meeting in Warwick on Monday night: ?I do not work for the hotels. I work for Bermuda.

?Expedia is the number one. Doesn?t it make sense that we should use the number one booking agent? Why should we stay with something because it?s an in-house thing when the people we are going after are in the world? We are going after the whole world so we want the biggest suction machine we can get.? Mr. Dodwell ? the owner of the Reefs Hotel in Southampton ? had said Government needed to do a better job of communicating with the hotel industry.