Shadow Tourism Minister Mr. David Allen lambasted the Department of Tourism yesterday for failing to take part in a major American trade show.

The New York Times Travel Trade Show, billed as "the largest travel trade show on the (US) east coast,'' was held at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City's Times Square on March 16.

Among the participants at the event, which was held "for the purpose of sharing comprehensive information on travel destinations and organisations'' with northeastern US travel agents, were many of the Island's traditional holiday competitors, including Mexico, Jamaica, Antigua and St. Lucia.

The show, which also saw exhibits by tourist bureaus in Europe and Asia, attracted more than 100 travel-related exhibitors overall.

"I would have thought that this was something we would very much want to have been involved with,'' Mr. Allen told The Royal Gazette yesterday.

"The New York Times is a national newspaper whose readership and influence spread well beyond New York City, and this may well be one example of an instance in which our competitors -- not only the fun and sun destinations but Europe and other cultural tourism centres as well -- are getting the upper hand.'' "I have always believed,'' the Opposition MP continued, "that Bermuda should be competing with Europe in the area of cultural tourism. We have that going for us and we should be pursuing it more actively.'' Mr. Allen, who has criticised the Department's less than conspicuous presence at travel industry trade shows in the past, was particularly worried yesterday that Bermuda would become a case of "out of sight-out of mind'' in the view of foreign travel agents.

Citing an instance in which the Bahamas' Tourism Department rented a Nile riverboat to promote its islands at an American Society of Travel Agents conference in Cairo, Mr. Allen also felt that the Bermudian tourism authority wasn't wooing the overseas travel agent as aggressively as it could be.

"We may not want to do it as ambitiously as the Bahamas but we should have something at these shows. (At the recent ASTA conference) in Lisbon, for example, we sent a delegation of three and had no stall at all.'' Mr. Allen added: "I've had feedback from travel agents. They all wonder why Bermuda isn't represented more, why we allow some of our key competitors to participate in these things without our having a presence there.'' In the case of the New York Times show, Tourism Director Mr. Gary Phillips told The Royal Gazette yesterday that his staff in Manhattan were aware of the one-day event but were busy preparing for the ASTA eastern regional conference that was held around that time.

Mr. Phillips also pointed out that the Times show was one of many in the travel universe and that the Department had to be selective in terms of which ones it chooses to involve itself with.

"You can easily get lost in these omnibus type of shows,'' the Tourism Director said. "We find it much more productive if we organise our own shows for our own audience.'' Mr. Allen, however, found it odd that a Department which claimed to focus its resources on key regional markets would chose to ignore a trade show in one of the most important.

And he dismissed the Tourism Director's assertion that his staff were too busy with other matters.

"I would have thought that it would have been easier to participate in the New York show,'' he said. "We have an office just a few blocks away.''