1. Cornwall had escaped the worst of the pandemic. Infection rates were relatively low. However, local residents felt vulnerable to infection on two counts.
a) There is only one hospital equipped to deal with severe cases (in Truro) and only 18 ICU (intensive care) beds for the whole county.
b) The county has an ageing demographic many of whom had been advised to shield at home.
As a result, local residents were fearful of importing the virus into the county via a wave of visitors from areas with higher infection rates.
2. Locals were alarmed by images of day visitors crowding on to the beaches at places such as Bournemouth (see image below) and the total absence of:
a) Social distancing.
b) The use of face masks.
c) This was behaviour which local residents believed would put their health at increased risk.
Whilst 1 in 5 jobs are dependent on tourism 4 in 5 are not. Add in the significant number of retired people in the county and there is a sizeable majority for whom tourism is a curse rather than a blessing, even in normal times.
Subsequently the arrival of visitors played out to the concerns of locals. Complaints included the following.
Papers quoted locals as being “too scared to go out”, of feeling “forced back into shielding” and of keeping their children away from the beaches and other areas of the town. Some even took their antipathy towards tourists to higher levels (see image below).
However, there were also the more usual complaints:
Clearly, local residents were understandably concerned about increased risks of infection, but it also brought into sharper focus long-standing concerns and complaints around the impact of tourism.
The sheer numbers descending on Cornwall made social control difficult. Mass tourism has the tendency to impose itself and its behaviour patterns on resident populations who feel powerless as a result. That in turn leads to conflict between those who benefit from tourism and those who suffer its consequences. The result, in Cornwall, is a community pulling in different directions.
By contrast another tourist destination, Islay, an island two hours from the Scottish mainland, exhibited none of the febrile atmosphere or concerns expressed by Cornwall’s resident population (see image below).
1. The number of tourists visiting Islay, even in a normal year is much lower (60,000 as against 4 million for Cornwall). It is not a mass tourism destination. Given that, and its separation from the mainland, it was never likely to get a sudden influx of visitors.
2. Lockdown lasted much longer. Travel restrictions to the islands weren’t lifted until mid-July. Even then the flow of visitors to the Island was relatively small.
3. The main event, the annual whiskey festival which attracts upwards of 30,000 visitors to the island at the end of May had already been cancelled.
4. There was no pressure to re-open tourist facilities.
a) The island enjoys full employment (whiskey distilling and agriculture).
b) Tourism, whilst a useful addition to the island economy, is not a key economic sector.
c) Some businesses were content to rely on government financial support (e.g. furlough) rather than re-open (see image below). The season was simply written off.
5. The population is only 3200. It is a small, tight knit community with a (seemingly) unified approach to the threat of COVID-19. The bottom line if you like for Islay was that health came before profit.
In the end the spike in cases Cornish residents worried about didn’t materialise, perhaps because locals simply avoided contact with visitors as much as they could and where they couldn’t, followed government advice; plus the tourist industry, in Cornwall, recouped at least some of the lost revenue. Whether all Cornish folk felt it justified the risk is an open question.
In the face of the threat from COVID-19 the lifting of lockdown and resumption of tourism to Islay was manageable and there was a perception that the situation was under control. The same could not be said for the residents of Cornwall.
The tourist season is over for another year. But what about 2021? The coronavirus will still be with us, and it is possible that foreign travel restrictions will still be in place. So, the “staycation” is likely to become part of the “new normal”. Will this put more of our holiday destinations under pressure? If so, it will be interesting to see how their residents react.
Note: The author of this blog visited Islay in early September 2020. Comments and perceptions are based on conversations with local residents.
