Hush! Hush! Whisper who dares. Jersey tourism is saying its prayers.

Guess what? I have just seen the year-end tourism statistics for 2006. They have been quietly posted on the Jersey Tourism business website . So, has 2006 been a good year? Let’s see:

• Total Arrivals – DOWN 4.6% (54,000 fewer arrivals)
• Staying leisure visitors – DOWN 4% (15,400 fewer people)
• Hotel/Guest House room occupancy – DOWN 3% (to 67% of available beds)

Not quite the continued improvement expected, or indeed heralded at the end of 2005. The small increase in visitors in 2005 then led the Minister responsible for Jersey Tourism, Senator Philip Ozouf to state that this was the ‘first sign of a reversal in our fortunes’.

At this stage, there are no detailed figures to confirm whether the average length of stay also decreased last year – as it has been doing for the past decade or more, from an average 6 nights in 1993 to 4.8 nights in 2005.

I know that one years figures don’t make a trend and the upturn in 2005 was probably just a blip. And there was a bit of good news in 2006! Business visitors increased by 7% to over 60,000. But hang on they only stayed 2.13 nights – that’s down 2.2% on 2005 and down 11% on just six years ago.

No – I am sure that the new tourism strategy, the new hotels, the new-look airport, the new Waterfront, the new tourism PPP, the new TV advert, the new air routes, the new ferry services, the new Liberation festival are all going to make a big difference! So the 15,000 drop in staying visitors is nothing to worry about.

That’s OK then. I am, however, looking forward to seeing the spin put on yet another set of disappointing results.