Online Travel UK and Welsh tourism businesses warn new holiday accommodation rules are ‘manifestly disproportionate’

They say the rules will reduce consumer choice, limit visibility for Welsh businesses, and make it harder for customers to find and book legitimate properties. 

The concerns raised by Online Travel UK (OTUK) have been echoed by self-catering businesses and accommodation providers in Wales who have labelled the legislation “poorly thought out” and “unworkable”.  

Under the Development of Tourism and Regulation of Visitor Accommodation (Wales) Bill, online booking platforms could be held liable if an accommodation provider fails to comply with stringent new licensing rules, provides incorrect information about the property, or fails to include an accurate registration number in their online listing.  

However, OTUK, whose members include major online accommodation booking platforms in the UK, along with many other booking and metasearch sites offering accommodation in Wales, has warned that the current proposals could result in booking platforms being held criminally liable for information they have no control over.  

In a letter sent to the Welsh Government, OTUK says that while it supports fair and proportionate regulation of the visitor economy and is keen to work constructively with the Welsh Government, these changes go far beyond the liability that is placed on booking platforms elsewhere and will undermine legal protections that allow online businesses to operate effectively for consumers and travel providers. 

OTUK says that the changes are “a significant extension of general monitoring obligations for platforms which goes far beyond well-established legal concepts of intermediary liability and the principle that online businesses should only be liable for illegal content once it has been brought to their attention and they have had an opportunity to remove it.”  

It adds that “protections like this are fundamental to the functioning of digital markets in the UK” and that it is “manifestly disproportionate” to hold online businesses and individuals employed by them legally liable for actions of which they have “no control, no responsibility and no awareness.” 

OTUK explains that it supports the desire to ensure only validly registered and licensed properties can be listed - as its members do in many countries - and that platforms can take significant steps to support compliance and prevent fraud, for example by mandating hosts to display registration or licence numbers, and by operating robust notice-and-takedown processes to enable the swift removal of non-compliant listings when issues are identified. 

Lisa Stopher, Managing Director of West Wales Holiday Cottages, said, “These measures are disproportionate, poorly thought out, and if implemented would make it impossible for us to continue to advertise local self-catering accommodation in Mid and West Wales.” 

Nicky Williamson, Director of the Professional Association of Self Caterers Cymru, said, “Proposals to make advertising platforms of any size and scale liable for the declarations made by self-catering operators in Wales are unworkable, and would simply mean that self-catering properties lost the ability to market their properties on these valuable booking channels.” 

Like OTUK, West Wales Holiday Cottages and the Professional Association of Self Caterers Cymru gave evidence to the Senedd Economy, Trade & Rural Affairs Committee last year.  

In a report published on December 19, the Senedd has also asked for the legislation to be changed, warning that “it is important that Wales is not put at a disadvantage as a result of these provisions."  

Carl Thomson, Public Policy Manager at Airbnb and spokesperson for Online Travel UK, said; “It is unclear to us whether the Welsh Government recognises the extent to which it is proposing such a significant departure from the long-standing framework on digital regulation in the UK.  

“We are urging them to adopt the recommendations from the Senedd and revisit the bill in response to the representations of a wide variety of businesses, from global booking platforms through to smaller hospitality businesses in Wales whose livelihoods will be most affected.” 

The Welsh Government said the bill introduced by Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Welsh Language Mark Drakeford MS aims to promote the development of tourism in Wales.

They say if it is passed it will restate and modernise the Welsh Ministers' functions of promoting tourism in Wales, regulate the provision of visitor accommodation in Wales by introducing a licensing regime to reassure visitors that accommodation meets the standards they would expect and aligning those standards, in the case of self-catering accommodation, more closely with corresponding standards already applicable to the private rented sector in Wales, making a standard in relation to the fitness of visitor accommodation a contractual requirement, and establishing a visitor accommodation directory for the purpose of providing information to the public about visitor accommodation in Wales.