Everyone Joins The Tourist Industry

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30953, 8 January 1966, Page 12

Everyone Joins The Tourist Industry

The Minister of Tourism (Mr Eyre) has announced plans for a “ two-pronged approach ” to encourage Australians to spend their holidays in New Zealand. In Australia, his department and the travel agencies will no doubt make much of the “ haere mai ” theme. Although these words of welcome are not so easily pronounced, they may yet be as effective as “ aloha ” has been for the Hawaiian Islands. The second prong must be deftly and gently applied. This is the effort to translate the assurance offered abroad into the real welcome given in New Zealand. As Mr Eyre has said, New Zealanders can help to do this by showing courtesies and friendship to visitors.

This much should not be difficult. It is not necessary, as it was in France, to try to improve the reputation of the country by offering prizes to people whom tourists considered especially friendly or helpful. The French Government last year launched a campaign of “ welcome and amiability ” to banish the sourness with which visitors to France were often received. Visitors arriving at Orly and Le Bourget airports were offered roses; visitors landing at Nice were presented with carnations. Foreign tourists received books of “ smile cheques ” to be issued to Frenchmen who treated them well. Frontier posts were repainted, and customs officials and policemen were instructed to be friendly and gentle with visitors from abroad.

All this would be unnecessarily artificial in New Zealand, especially if it were contrived to impress our Australian neighbours. Yet, too frequently, shortcomings can be observed in the way visitors are received. These shortcomings do not stem from any real ill will. They derive from indifference, from lack of professional competence or self-assurance, or from a disinclination to accept the notion that our way of doing things may not be the only way. Visitors do not usually expect us to change our ways; they will usually fall in with them happily if their initial uncertainty is met with a little charm, and perhaps some explanation. If they go away disappointed we should at least be ready to recognise any genuine deficiencies we have shown as hosts. Many New Zealand tourists have returned disappointed from abroad. They were not disillusioned by what they saw; they were offended or irked by the manner in which they were treated on some occasion—by restaurant waiters, by hotel staff, by customs officials, by travel agents, or just by people in the streets. Equally, the most favourable recollections are usually those concerning people they met. In this sense, everyone is a member of the tourist industry; and the New Zealand tourist industry is increasingly becoming a useful part of our livelihood.