Will Brexit Affect Canadian Travel?

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Canada can weather any implications that might be caused by people of the United Kingdom’s monumental decision to leave the European Union. Or so says Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“Canada has tremendous economic fundamentals that we are strengthening with key investments in infrastructure and measures to grow our middle class,” said Trudeau in a statement earlier today. “We are well positioned to weather global market uncertainty as we have done in the past.”

Prime Minister Trudeau’s words are at odds with those of TD Bank, which warned that much of Canada’s economic growth could be lost after yesterday’s historic vote, as well as those of Huffington Post, which reported a “bloodbath [that] washed over global markets.”

When it comes to travel, however, the news might not be all bad.

While several Online Travel Agencies (OTAs), including Expedia.ca and Cheapflights.ca. have reported a dip in interest when it comes to interest in travel to Great Britain, neither website could directly attribute that decline to the Brexit conversation.

And the dip could also just be a normal course correction after the UK enjoyed a banner year with respect to inbound travelling Canadians. While many predicted that Canadians would carefully guard their budgets and stay closer to home last year, Canadians clearly did not get that memo with respect to travel to the United Kingdom.

In fact, Canadian traffic to the United Kingdom last year was up 9 per cent over 2014. (A noticeable juxtaposition from the dramatic decline in Canadian travellers to the United States.) In total, 704,000 Canadians visited the U.K. in 2015, and spent £506 million, an increase of 7 per cent in spending.

Room nights and average length of stay also increased (11.5 per cent and 2 per cent, respectively) over the previous year. For Canadian travellers, the busiest months for travel last year was July through September, and the main reason for visiting was visits to relatives and friends (41 per cent), followed by leisure trips (38 per cent.)

“Even with the fluctuations in the exchange rate, Canadians saw value for the money,” said Dana O’ Malley, Marketing & Communications Manager for VisitBritain.

And with the British Pound falling to a 7-year low, Canadians might continue to find incredible in travelling to the United Kingdom for the foreseeable future.

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