Bath leads spa town revival as Britons take to the waters

It is hard to imagine that Droitwich was once as fashionable as St Tropez. Or that Buxton attracted the kind of beautiful people who now flock to Aspen.

But for 150 years, up until the turn of the last century, Europe's aristocracy took their holidays in Britain's spa towns.

Now a new report calls for a return to that Golden Age. The official study claims the economy is losing billions of pounds because British tourists who want to take health spa holidays are being forced abroad to do so.

The report by the English Tourism Council, published on Tuesday, reveals that of England's remaining 10 spa towns – there used to be 220 – the public can only bathe in one of them. And that's a "small brine bath" in Droitwich spa in a private hospital that opens its doors to the general public on afternoons only.

The report will say that spa towns could bring in an extra £1.4bn a year if only the "right kinds of facilities" were available. While some Britons do take "spa breaks" in the UK at modern health farms, three-quarters go abroad for such holidays.

"Experience on the Continent shows that the spa sector can be very lucrative," says the report, "Their gain is England's loss." According to the report, UK residents take around 13.8 million spa trips per year, but only half of those trips are in England and only 17 per cent of the total £8bn is spent here.

The first sign of a renaissance in the fortunes of the remaining spa towns will come in the autumn when Bath opens a new £22m thermal bath, more than 20 years after the last public baths closed in the city. Buxton is also planning to open a £15m complex.

Paul Simons, chairman of the British Spas Federation, said the report showed the need for a revival in spa towns and health tourism.

"It shows people are no longer relying on the NHS but using their spare time and their own disposable income to look after their own health and well being," he said.

He described the demise of the spa town as very sad and attributed it to a number of reasons. "The spa towns were considered old-fashioned. They were associated with sickness and ill health," said Mr Simons, "If you were healthy you didn't want to go to a place with an image of ill health.

"But in their heyday, which lasted 150 years from the mid-18th century, Britain was leading the way in terms of spa facilities and health care. The aristocracy and all the major royal families of Europe came to the UK to take waters.

"I believe traditional British spa towns could be in an excellent position to capitalise on new market opportunities."

The new Bath Spa will take the hot springs running under the town and pump them into a new pool. The natural springs run at a temperature of 45 degrees centigrade – too hot for comfortable bathing. So the water will first be passed through heat exchangers to cool it and the excess energy will be used to provide electricity to run the building.

"It will be one of the most cost efficient new buildings in the UK," promised Mr Simons. He will be hoping it proves a cost effective one too. The future of Britain's other spa towns may rest on its success.

Additional reporting by Robert Thickett