Peter Wiltshier

Senior Lecturer, University of Derby

My interest in community re-generation is borne out of an abiding concern for the role of the resident and host in local communities and the ways in which visitors and tourists are treated and accorded a welcome. My last piece of research before arriving in Derby in February 2004, was the millennium tourism project for the Chatham Islands, some 800 kilometres due east of Christchurch, New Zealand. A small, but growing band of entrepreneurs is now connecting with the indigenous people of the Islands and their public sector to develop community-based tourism for a remote but beautiful and desirable tourism destination for the twenty first century. I stand for responsible development of business in a creative and dedicated fashion. Creatively supporting communities to provide resources for their welfare and dedicated to the pursuit of a responsible future with a focus on the beautiful and important ‘Green Lungs’ of rural Britain in the East Midlands. My role as senior lecturer and programme leader for the courses in travel and tourism management at the University of Derby Buxton is to ensure that the public and private sector work together to develop resources and skills for communities to take charge of their own destinies. It is the pursuit of bottom-up planning and policy development that is sought and is to be enabled through my work and teaching.