Retail Travel Chains and Inclusive Travel - When?
In the Australian retail travel scene there are three major players, Stella Travel Services (Harvey World Travel and Travel Scene), Jetset/Travel World and Flight Centre.
The first two operate on a franchise model and the latter on the basis of company owned stores. Currently before the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is a proposal for a merger of Jetset Travelworld and Stella Travel Services. The merger is significant due to the concentration of market power it will create, not only in the franchised retail sector but also on the wholesale sector within within Australia. That effect is likely to be the most significant in the area of inclusive travel.
If we look back over the history of anti discrimination legislation worldwide starting with America's ADA we have seen a vast improvement in the level of access afforded to people with disabilities. Infrastructure has improved in buildings, homes, attractions public venues and now in public parks and gardens. Buses and trains have improved.
Through the information we have published here and on our main website it can be seen that there are a lot of choices available even if the information is still hard to find.
So why is the merger relevant?
Despite the fact that there are accessible facilities available the two areas that have not taken on inclusive travel at all are the tour operators or the retail travel industry. In Australia none of the retail chains have any provision to service people with disabilities. There are no trained staff and not even a special accessible hotline. There is no pressure to bear on any of the tour operators or wholesalers to provide any inclusive programs within their tour offerings and it is left to small independent operators to fill what is regarded here as a "niche" not inclusive market.
It is incredulous really to think that all tour operators actually have access to the facilities that have been built as a result of legislation like the ADA but refuse to include it. If we take the Canada and Alaska Program as a case in point, from the information presented here over the past couple of years it will be seen that the entire "Rocky Mountain Tourist Circuit" and the Alaskan cruise is accessible. There is accommodation, accessible sightseeing and the three major coach operators have accessible coaches as part of their fleets.
The infrastructure exists so why are there no tour programs?
It would seem that the statement from the Field of Dreams "Build it and they will come" does not hold true for accessible tourism.
The ACCC put out a request for information to the industry on certain aspects of the proposed merger but nothing on inclusive tourism. The merger, by further concentrating market power and potentially limiting access to smaller wholesalers to the major retail chains, will make it even harder to get inclusive tourism onto the mainstream agenda. Perhaps what is needed is a similar ADA type piece of legislation that starts to require retailers and wholesalers to provide a minimum percentage of inclusive tour product as part of their brochured offerings.
Implications World Wide
The example above is topical because there is a merger proposition on the table at the moment. What is does show is that there is a sector of industry that has paid little regard to the development of inclusive tourism. The retail sector world wide has ignored PWDs and the bricks and mortar sector especially have paid no heed to the recent Expedia decision. Apart from Flight Centre Canada, who took an interest in inclusive travel in the lead up to the Paralympic Games, I am not aware of any other major retail chain that has developed any expertise in the Travellers with Disabilities sector. Further, world wide the major Tour Operators like The Travel Corporation (with its brands of Trafalgar and Insight) Taulk, Globus, APT etc have and still shun the people with disabilities sector. This is despite more and more accessible infrastructure being built and more on-ground equipment provided. While I might not agree that prescribing percentages, as most of the worlds anti discrimination legislation does, leads to a cultural change towards inclusion, it would appear that the mainstream retail and wholesale industries need to be compelled to start providing inclusive holiday experiences otherwise much of the built accessible infrastructure will lie idle.