Boost in overseas visitors to UK during April
A record number of international visitors arrived in the UK during April, according to the new International Passenger Survey from the Office for National Statistics.
There were a total of 3.14m visits throughout the month, 6% more than in the same month last year, and after three months of decline in spend, there was a 1% increase to £1.5b.
Inbound visits hit a new record of more than 10 million for the first four months of a year, although spend for the same period of £5b was down by 7%.
April was a strong month for all types of visit, with business, holiday and visits to friends and relatives seeing growth of 18%, 6% and 4% respectively.
Patricia Yates, director of strategy and communications at VisitBritain, said it was promising to see a considerable return to growth in the run-up to the peak summer months. "We expect 2015 and 2016 to be more challenging for inbound tourism as the euro weakens, making it even more important to get our value message across to potential European visitors. We also need to act to safeguard our longhaul markets such as the US and China who see European pricing as particularly attractive this summer."
Record inbound tourism figures for 2014 >>
Tourist spend to British regions breaks records, says VisitBritain >>
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