TRAVEL AGENTS’ TOUR

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26560, 24 October 1951, Page 8

TRAVEL AGENTS’ TOUR

EXCLUSION OF WEST COAST RESORTS MAYOR OF GREYMOUTH PROTESTS (From Our Own Reporter) GREYMOUTH, October 23. A protest against the apparent exclueion of the West Coast and its scenic attractions from an official tour of the Dominion bv representatives of Canadian travel agencies was made to the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr W. A. Bodkin) by the Mayor of Greymouth (Mr F. L. Turley) to-day. a Three representatives of Canadian travel agencies will to-morrow begin from Auckland a tour sponsored by New Zealand travel interests and the Department of Tourist and Publicity, to survey New Zealand tourist prospects. “I waseamazed, on reading a Press Association message announcing this tour, to see that the most important of the country’s tourist resorts—those in the South Westland glacier region—have been omitted from the itinerary,” said Mr Turley to-day. An emphatic protest had been made to the Government, and it had been urged to give the Canadian officials an opportunity of assessing the appeal to their countrymen of the west Coast resorts. Attractions of West Coast No other part of New Zealand lent itself to development as a scenic area so well as the West Coast, said Mr Tprley. The visiting officials should be told of the beautiful'trip that would be available to tourists on the completion of the Haast Pass road. Mr Turley said it was agreed that it would be equal to any other drive in the world. •

A protest against the exclusion of the West Coast from the tour has also been made to Mr Bodkin by the Westland District Progress League. In a telegram to Mr Bodkin to-day, Mr F. A. Kitchingham, president of the league, eaid that the league was “greatly perturbed at the Press Association message of last Saturday which shows that your department has completely ignored the genuine claims of this district for inspection by the three Canadian travel agency representatives. “We register the strongest possible protest at the exclusion of this district, and urge you, with your full knowledge of what the West Coast has to oner, to have the visitors’ tour rearranged so that this district is included In their travels,’’ Mr Kitchingham concluded.