WELCOME to Yorkshire has posted losses of almost £200,000 over the past two years in its latest published accounts, which includes the departure of former chief Sir Gary Verity.

The tourism board made a loss of £127,140 in the six months to March 2020, which followed a £71,857 loss over the previous 18 months. This compared to a £250,000 profit in 2018.

In the financial statements, these losses were said to be a “going concern”, as the company had to be given £1.16 million by Yorkshire councils last September to meet its day-to-day needs.

This was largely caused by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, which saw income from business rates fall and was a major blow to the county’s popular tourism and hospitality industry.

This also included the cancellation of the hugely popular Tour de Yorkshire cycling event last summer and the loss of business and corporate sponsors due the cancellation of events.

However Welcome to Yorkshire is confident it will have enough funds to continue working over the next tax year, the reports, which were published on Companies House earlier this week, state.

This is despite the Tour de Yorkshire, arguably the company’s flagship event, being cancelled again this year due to coronavirus.

The resignation of former chief executive Sir Gary Verity, who left his post in March 2019, also impacted on finances at the tourism board.

In the accounts, it states that Welcome to Yorkshire incurred staff termination costs of £151,568, which coupled with legal and professional fees of £280,055 cost the company £431,623, however nowhere does it state these figures relate solely to Sir Gary’s departure.

As The Press reported back in November last year, City of York Council was asked to support Welcome to Yorkshire - putting more than £55,000 towards helping the organisation - despite admitting to a challenging relationship with the tourism body in recent years.

Welcome to Yorkshire (WTY) asked councils across the region for £1.4 million in total to help them stay afloat.

Wakefield Council and Hull City Council have publicly refused to provide the extra funding - but a York council report said the body is believed to have received £1.16m of the £1.4m requested from local authorities including the national parks.

Twenty per cent of jobs in York are in tourism.